T206 Research – Page 4 – That T206 life

Why Aren’t T206 with Two Different Names on Top and Bottom More Popular with Collectors?

Luke May 24, 2017 May 25, 2017

As you know if you’ve been reading my stuff for awhile, I love to delve into the minutiae and oddities of the T206 set. T206 collectors love print goofs and errors, but for some reason, cards with two different names on top and bottom (let’s call them “two namers” from here on out for the sake of brevity) have been given the cold shoulder by collectors.

In my opinion, these cards are incredibly cool. They offer insight into how the cards were laid out on the sheets when they were printed. To date, no complete uncut T206 sheets have ever been found. As a result, it’s been left up to T206 researchers to try and figure out how those sheets may have looked.

One thing we know is that cards with the same name on top and bottom (we’ll call these “double namers” are much, much more common than two namers. What this tells us is that the sheets were printed with multiple copies of the same card stacked vertically. To be totally honest, I can’t remember what the general consensus is on how many of the same card were stacked vertically.

It has been awhile since I have seen anyone debate it. As is often the case, this article may lead me to research that topic and write an article on that subject. It is important enough to be worthy of it’s own article in my opinion. I seem to remember people talking about there possibly being nine of the same pose printed in a row vertically. This makes sense when you look at the ratio of DOUBLE NAMER : TWO NAMERS. I’ve also read the theory that some cards which seem to be short-printed may have just been printed in quantities smaller than nine. To me this theory has always made a lot of sense. I would think that ATC and the printers would want to have more copies of the popular players than the lesser known players.

As you can see with these scans, the degree to which the second name shows varies widely. The few copies that look like the Beaumont at the top of this article tend sell for strong prices, while the examples with only part of the second name showing do not fetch nearly the same premium. In many cases, collectors won’t pay any premium at all for one of these cards. This baffles me honestly.

I understand why collectors prefer examples with the full name on top, but I think even the ones with just a sliver of a second name are cool. Just personal preference, but I’d much rather have a two namer with just a bit of the second name than a card with a mis-aligned back, even though the “back mis-cuts” sell for a much larger premium.

Spade / Cicotte & Lindaman / Bresnahan portrait

There are collectors who will pay a few thousand dollars for a T206 Murr’y, simply because a bit of the brown ink for the name was not applied, but two namers get no love. To me, the two namers are a much more interesting anomaly. This Chance with Fiene on top recently sold at auction for the minimum bid of $200. In this condition, I’d imagine the card would be worth right about $200 without the second name.

I know of only a few guys who have been collecting two namers over the years. I expect that some day these cards will get more respect, and when they do, people will realize just how few of them are out there. And, the guys who have been hoarding them will be rewarded. Time will tell of course. As we know, rarity doesn’t equal value. In my humble opinion, it’s hard to understand why these cards aren’t in higher demand.

T206 Hall of Fame Front/Back Combo Power Rankings: The Elite (Top 10)

Luke May 15, 2017 May 14, 2017 2 Comments

I was talking with a friend last week about the Tris Speaker Drum that ended in Memory Lane recently and the phrase “Top 10 front/back combo” rolled off my tongue in explaining how significant a card it is. I had a strong feeling that Speaker belonged in the top 10, but I wasn’t exactly sure what the list actually looked like. So I figured, why not put together a Top Ten list of the most desirable Hall of Fame front/back examples? I’ve chosen to leave Wagner and Plank off the list because they are coveted for their fronts rather than the combination of their fronts and a rare back. I’m also leaving the Ty Cobb back off this list as it is debatable whether that card should be classified as a T206. That is probably a subject for a future article. Without further ado, here it is (in my humble opinion of course):

#1. Ty Cobb Red Portrait Broad Leaf 460

The biggest star in the set combined with the scarcest back (not counting Brown Old Mill and Brown Lenox, which were produced by mistake). There is one copy of this card known in the hobby. I wrote an article about the incredible collection that this card resides in. You may read about it here if you are so inclined.

#2. Ty Cobb Red Portrait Drum

No surprise here. Cobb’s second most desirable front/back combo is the Drum. As of this writing, there are three examples known. Two are graded by PSA and one by SGC.

#3. Ty Cobb Bat off Shoulder Brown Lenox

Another near impossible Cobb card, this one has been graded twice, once each by PSA and SGC.

#4. Walter Johnson Hands at Chest Broad Leaf 460

The Big Train’s most desirable cards comes in fourth on the list. There appear to be two known copies, both incredibly nice. The above SGC 60 and a PSA 4.5. It’s very possible that this is just one card, which has been crossed from the SGC 60 to a PSA 4.5.

#5. Cy Young Glove Shows Broad Leaf 460

There appears to be only one copy of this card, and it is an absolute beauty. SGC graded this card above, and PSA has graded a PSA 5.5. I am guessing this card was purchased in the SGC holder and crossed over to a PSA slab.

#6. Christy Mathewson Dark Cap Broad Leaf 460

Matty’s most sought after card clocks in a sixth. Really, I could arranged Matty, Cy, and WaJo in any order, but I think this order is most in line with the prices that each card tends to sell for. SGC has graded two copies of this combo (both graded “A”) and PSA has not graded any.

#7. Walter Johnson Hands at Chest Drum

There appear to be two copies of this card graded. This one graded by SGC and likely crossed to a PSA 4, and another PSA 1.5.

#8. Christy Mathewson Dark Cap Drum

This combo has not been graded by either SGC or PSA. It is however, confirmed to exist on T206resource.com.

#9. Tris Speaker Drum

The first non-Cobb/WaJo/Young/Matty on the list is Tris Speaker’s most desirable front/back combo. SGC and PSA each show a single entry for this card, and both are graded “1”s.

10. Ty Cobb Bat off Shoulder Uzit

The fourth Cobb on the list and the only Uzit, this combo barely edged out the honorable mentions below. This combo is significantly easier to find than any above. SGC has graded four copies, while PSA has graded six.

Honorable Mentions:

Addie Joss Hands at Chest Broad Leaf 460

Mordecai Brown Chicago on Shirt Broad Leaf 460

Nap Lajoie With Bat Brown Lenox

Frank Chance Yellow Portrait Drum

Sam Crawford Batting Drum

T206 Misspelled Names: Sorry Pal, We Got Your Name Wrong!

Luke April 30, 2017 April 30, 2017

I’m pleased to bring you another fun guest article from my friend Scott Gross. Thanks Scott! Enjoy!

If you’re lucky enough to get a Baseball card, you would like to think the producers would get your name spelled correctly. Well, with T206s, that was not always the case. Of the 524 cards in the set, there are 24 misspelled names. Maybe that isn’t so bad considering that T206s were one of the first, and certainly biggest issues of the day. Also, these were cheap advertising, so getting them into circulation could easily have been more important than 100% correctness. Have to cut them some slack.

The list below was taken from the grand website t206resource.com (as well as Print Group information). I did exclude three names off their list. Two McGraws and LaPorte. In my opinion the gaps between McGraw and Mc Graw, and LaPorte and La Porte are not significant misspellings.

Of course, the most famous misspelling is that of Magie. This mistake was corrected very early on in Print Group 1(to the correct Magee). So early that the Magie card is much rarer, and sought after by many T206 collectors. My first thought when thinking about this article was Magie/Magee was done just because he was the only Print Group 1 card. Figuring that the producers wanted everything done right in this initial printing. This is not correct. In fact, there are eight other misspellings in Group 1.

Now, arguably most of these are not household names. Good, decent players, but maybe not good enough to double check them in production. The one that jumps out at me the most is Brown/Browne. He was about the same level of player as Magee. Both were everyday outfielders for non-pennant winning teams, and had similar stats between 1904-09 (Browne, NY National, 275 BA; Magee, Philadelphia National, 291 BA). So why was Magie corrected and not Brown ? Who knows !!!

Another oddity is the trio of Goode, Livingstone, and Violat. Where the correct names are, in general, more popular spellings. Almost had to go out of their way to be wrong. However, with most others, the different ways of spelling are probably close to even. I wish I had an old phone book (remember those ??!!) to verify that.

The ones I find the most interesting are those who have multiple cards, and yet have both correct and incorrect spellings:

Doolin is misspelled on his Portrait from the 150-350 Series. However, was corrected in his later Bat and Fielding cards. Same with Magee Fielding, and Meyers Portrait. Being misspelled initially, and then corrected.

Then, there are my favorites. The ones where the player’s name was originally correct, yet later poses were changed to incorrect !!!!!

Nicholls hands on knees is correct in his first printing, then incorrect (Nichols), on the subsequent batting pose. The same for the initially correct Willett batting, which was followed by the incorrectly spelled Willetts (throwing). Just couldn’t leave well enough alone. The most bizarre, is Mullen/Mullin. Who goes from correct (Mullin throwing) in Print Group 1, to incorrect (Mullen portrait) in Group 2, then back to correct (Mullin with bat) in Group 3.

Finally, let us not for get good old Harry Lentz, who’s correct name is Sentz. At least the others are recognizable …………….. “Sorry, buddy, we misspelled your name!!!!!”

Written by Scott Gross

T206 Donie Bush With Interesting Print Mark – But Only On the Rarest Backs?

Luke April 20, 2017

High resolution scan of the Broad Leaf 350

Monday 4/17/2017:

Continuing with the recent theme of examining print oddities and errors, here is a Donie Bush with rare Broad Leaf 350 back that has a unique print error. The area directly to the left of his glove appears to be missing the gray ink for his uniform, and as a result it looks pink to the naked eye. As of now, this is the only known copy of Bush with a Broad Leaf 350 back, so there aren’t any others to compare this one to.

However, I was chatting with a friend about this card, and he sent me this scan, of a Donie Bush Carolina Brights that he once owned. Note the the print defect in exactly the same spot. I had examined a high resolution scan of the Broad Leaf and was convinced that the spot was missing ink, rather than altered in some way. Often, when you see mark that looks like this, it will have been created by a eraser. This Carolina Brights scan serves as a nice confirmation that both cards were printed with the pink spot at the factory.

Upon being alerted as to the existence of this Carolina Brights card, I began to scour the internet looking for other examples with the same “pink spot”. What I found was quite surprising. So far, I have not found a single copy of Bush with a common back that exhibits the flaw. No Piedmont, Sweet Caporal, Polar Bear, Old Mill, or Sovereign backs that I found had the “pink spot”. However, the lone Cycle 350 that I found did have it:

Wednesday 4/19/2017:

After finding the Cycle 350 scan, I spent the next couple days looking for other examples of the “pink spot”. I posted a thread on net54 asking for scans and reached out to a few friends. The net54 query paid off immediately when long-time back collector Brian Weisner reached out to me with scans of the Carolina Brights above, and an American Beauty below, which does not have the print flaw. Brian told me that the “pink spot” appears on 2 of the 5 Donie Bush Carolina Brights that are known to exist.

This American Beauty does not exhibit the “pink spot” print anomaly

At that point, I was pretty sure that I wouldn’t find any common backs with the print flaw, but that changed when Pat Romolo joined the search. Pat is the foremost expert in T206 Print Oddities/Anomalies. Many of you are probably familiar with Pat’s Piedmont 150 Plate Scratch Project (ironically the thread was started by Steve Birmingham, who is the foremost expert on the printing process(es) used to create T206s) . If not, you should definitely check it out.

Pat noted that Bush shares the same back profile as George McBride. McBride has a print anomaly that Pat has been following, which he he has dubbed the “blue flame”. McBride’s print anomaly has been found on the following backs:

So, theoretically with enough searching we may be able to find the “pink spot” anomaly on these same five backs above. Later in the afternoon, Pat emailed me with the following scan:

At that point, my theory that the “pink spot” would only be found with the rarest backs was proven incorrect. I’ll keep my eye out for more copies with this anomaly, and possibly post an update sometime in the future. As of now, I have not seen a scan of a Piedmont 350 with the “pink spot” but based on the existence of the SC 350/30 above, I imagine there are some out there.

The T206 George Gibson with Ghost Image That Sold Last Weekend

Luke April 16, 2017

This little gem was sold last weekend via PWCC Auctions. The auction boasted an impressive array of T206s, and this one was kind of buried among the offerings. It was listed as “Ghost Image” due to the dark rectangle that appears over the front of the bottom 90% of the card. When I first saw it, I was pretty sure I knew what the faint lighter image on the on the ghost overprint was, but I needed to verify. I am not particularly good with Photo Shop, but I thought it might be fun to show the process I used to figure out who the ghost was anyway

I thought it looked like the ghost overprint was upside down, so first I turned the image upside down:

In this particular case, I had a hunch of who the ghost might be right when I first saw the card. However, there have been plenty of times when I haven’t been so sure when looking at a T206 with a ghost image. In those cases, the first step in the sleuthing process is to identify any distinguishing marks (or in this case, the spots on the ghost overprint which are lighter than the rest of the ghost).

Once you’ve found some spots to look for, you need to go through other cards that were printed in the same series. In this case, Gibson is a 150-350 subject and this card has a Piedmont 150 back. So, if the ghost overprint features another T206 pose, it will be one of the other 155 poses from the Piedmont 150 checklist. When I am searching for a possible match, I like to use the checklists at T206resource.com and click on the scan links at the right side of the page. You can scroll through the entire 150-350 Series checklist on this page.

Like I mentioned earlier, I had a hunch right away. I pulled up this pose, and found an immediate match:

I wish I had the Photo Shop skills of Chris Browne or Erick Summers, but unfortunately this is the best I can do. If you look closely, you can see that the previously identified lighter spots on Gibson line up perfectly with Eddie Cicotte’s right arm and the creases in his pants. How this card might have come to exist is a mystery to me. I suppose the lighter ghost print could have come first, with the printer’s realizing that the sheet was placed upside down and then turning it around and printing the entire card again. This fun error card sold for $249.83. I imagine most bidders were not sure what they were looking at, but the winner most likely knew that the ghost was Cicotte.

Does the Huge Price Tag for the T206 Magie Error Make Sense?

Luke April 14, 2017 April 13, 2017

This copy sold via Love of the Game Auctions for $15, 340 in 2013

As a T206 back collector, I tend to think about cards in terms of value. Which backs are over-valued? Which are under-valued? Which cards are over-rated, and which are under-appreciated? My favorite part of collecting this set is searching for value and scarcity, especially when it is hiding in plain sight.

It can be hard to impress T206 collectors. There are hundreds of specific front/back combos that exist in quantities of less than 10 and are met with a collective yawn from collectors when they hit the market. If a Cycle 350 Shad Barry SGC 30 goes to auction, it’s likely to sell for less than $100. If a Demmitt Polar Bear SGC 30 goes to auction, it will probably sell for around $1,000. PSA and SGC have combined to grade 4 copies of the Barry Cycle 350 and 278 copies of Demmitt Polar Bear. Pretty crazy when you really look at the numbers.

Obviously the Demmitt, O’Hara, and Magie cards are more highly sought after than a random Cycle 350 with a low population. The main reason is that many set collectors feel the need to own a Magie, O’Hara and Demmitt for their sets. However, there are plenty of T206 collectors who are not necessarily attempting to complete the set. For those people, I really wonder if the massive price tags for these 3 cards makes sense.

PSA has graded 118 copies of the Magie error (which only exists with a Piedmont 150 back). SGC has graded 62 of them. So, according to the Pop Reports, there are 180 Magie errors out there. Of course there have probably been some crossovers, but there are probably some raw copies out there too.

Sold for $1,028 via PWCC Auctions over the weekend

A few days ago, this PSA 4 Sherry Magee portrait with El Principe de Gales back sold for $1,028 via PWCC Auctions. PSA and SGC have combined to grade only 11 copies of this card.

Sold for $2,022 via Goodwin & Co. Auctions in 2016

Earlier in the year, Goodwin and Co. auctioned off the above Old Mill Magee portrait in an SGC 40 holder. It sold for $2,022. PSA and SGC have graded a combined 4 copies of this card.

The Pop Report Numbers for Magee Portrait with Hindu and Sovereign 150 backs are similarly low in comparison to the iconic Magie Error:

The Old Mill above is so rare that it’s almost non-existent, and yet it sold for just 13% of the $15,340 that the PSA 3 Magie pictured at the top of this article went for. We know that there is more to value than the supply side of the equation, but I can’t help but come to the conclusion that the Magie Error is over-valued. As long as collectors continue to covet the Magie Error to the extent they have historically, prices will remain high. With more information available to us via the Pop Reports, it’s possible that prices will adjust over time to be more in line with actual scarcity (or the lack thereof).

The T206 Piedmont 150 “Cylinder Print Ghosts”

Luke April 6, 2017

*This article features insight on the printing process used to create T206s courtesy of Steve Birmingham. Thanks Steve!

The Piedmont 150 Cylinder Print Ghosts are among my favorite T206 print oddities. They are unique in that the ghost image on the back is a crystal clear mirror image of the front. Cylinder prints are not exclusive to Piedmont 150 backs, but the most high profile Cylinder Prints are all from presumably the same Piedmont 150 sheet. There are some blank backs that have portions of the front image reversed on the back and I’ve seen a couple Piedmont 350s, but those are a subject for a different article.

To the best of my knowledge (and memory) this is the current checklist of known Piedmont 150 Cylinder Print Ghosts:

Bowerman
Chance red portrait (there are actually two of these)
Clarke portrait
Elberfeld NY
Gilbert
Overall portrait
Shaw St. Louis
Weimer (two of these are known)
Young bare hand shows

Here are some recent sales of the known copies:

Clarke portrait SGC 60 – SOLD for $4,200 in 2016 via REA
Elberfeld NY GAI 4.5 – SOLD for $2,160 in 2016 via REA
Young bare hand shows PSA 5 – SOLD for $2,350 in 2008 via REA

In order to understand how these beauties were created, I reached out to my friend Steve Birmingham, an expert on printing processes. His explanation is as follows:

Cylinder prints can happen for anything printed by offset lithography. Interesting fact- A cylinder print on an earlier flatbed press is what led to the invention of offset lithography. There are two basic sorts of press, flatbed offset and rotary. There’s proof that in general T206s were printed on flatbed presses, so I’ll stick to those at first.

On the flatbed press the prepared stone is placed on the bed. It has areas that are coated with a substance that repels water and the limestone will hold water. The stone is dampened, and then inked. On most flatbed presses there’s a carriage that moves the stone across the dampening , inking and offset rollers/cylinders. Once inked the inked image is transferred to the blanket. Next, the cylinder with the blanket turns up against the impression cylinder which may also have a rubber covering. The paper is squeezed in between them, making the image print from the blanket to the paper. And all is well!

Except the flatbed presses were mostly hand fed, and occasionally a paper sheet wouldn’t be fed in to print. In that case, the image would transfer to the impression cylinder. The next sheet would then get a reversed impression on the opposite side as well as the normal impression on the correct side.

And that’s where cylinder prints come from.

Of note, generally at the time the colors were printed one at a time. Being an accident the cylinder impression should only be one color. I’ve seen some indication that a two color press may have been used, but so far no two color cylinder impressions. A genuine one would be a real prize, as proof that a 2 color press was actually used.

Identification is usually pretty easy, as the impression will have lots of detail compared to a normal offset transfer, (Or WST as most people call them.) It is possible to have a fully detailed normal offset transfer, it just requires quite a bit of pressure on the stack of sheets. Most times there isn’t enough remaining wetness or enough pressure.

On more modern presses the impression cylinder is smooth metal with no rubber coating. But with the blanket being rubber, cylinder Impressions can still happen. Also the plate is on a roller and there’s no moving carriage, just a few more rollers.

*The bulk of this article (all of the technical stuff) was written by Steve Birmingham. Thank you Steve!

T206 Sweet Caporal 350 Factory 30 “Big Factory Numbers”

Luke April 1, 2017 April 2, 2017

A fun oddity to keep an eye for are the “Big Factory 30s”. Certain poses from the 150-350 series can be found with a large “30” right in the middle at the bottom of the back, like this Tannehill above. It appears that the large “30” was used to differentiate sheets of Sweet Caporal 350 factory 30 from Sweet Caporal 350 factory 25, and vice versa.

There have not been any of these “Big Factory Numbers” found on Sweet Caporal 150 backs that I know of. My guess is there were some problems in the print shop during 150 series production that lead to them adding these large numbers to the sheets for the 350 series, so that the process of getting them out to the correct factories would run more smoothly. This article focuses on the Big Factory 30s, mainly because we have more data about them. There are 22 different poses that have been found with a “Big Factory 30”, while I only know of two players who have been found with a “Big Factory 25” (Ames portrait and Steinfeldt portrait).

Here are the 22 poses which have been found with Sweet Caporal 350 “Big Factory 30s”. I expect that more will be discovered, but for now this is the known checklist. Thank you to Erick Summers for keeping track of these over on the net54 forum.

Ames (portrait)
Beaumont
Clarke (portrait)
Cobb (bat on shoulder)
Dahlen (Brooklyn)
Dooin
Durham
Gilbert
Hemphill
Johnson (portrait)
Jones, Fielder (portrait)
Keeler (with bat)
Killian (pitching)
Mathewson (portrait)
McGraw (no cap)
Merkle (portrait)
Overall (portrait)
Seymour (batting)
Spade
Steinfeldt (portrait)
Tannehill (“L” on front)
Wagner (bat left)

Erick and others have been keeping track of these oddities for the last few years in this thread on net54baseball.com. If you have or know of any Sweet Caporal 350s with Big Factory Numbers at the bottom (either 25 or 30) please stop by that thread and add your card or scan to the list.

For the most part, each of these checklist entries represents a unique card. However, some of the above poses have been found more than once. I have seen three different Steinfeldts for instance. Because not everyone knows about these cards, there are probably quite a few of them out there that have not been noticed yet. Often the top of the “30” is just barely visible, and doesn’t look like much more than a bit of red ink. This is another reason why these cards tend to fly under the radar.

The T206 Wildfire Schulte front view “Chicago” Proof

Luke March 26, 2017

The Schulte Chicago Proof is one of my favorite cards. I referenced this card in an earlier post titled “Examining the T206 Joe Tinker Hands on Knees “Chicago” Variation”. That article is worth a read, but the gist of it is that a few copies of Tinker hands on knees have been found with “CHICAGO” printed across his chest, and “CUBS” printed over “CHICAGO”. When the Tinker was discovered, the Schulte Chicago Proof was already known to the hobby.

In 1997, Keith Olbermann wrote an article for the Vintage & Classic Baseball Collector magazine entitled “How Many Cards in the T206 Set?”. The article included a scan of the Schulte Proof, which Mr. Olbermann owns. The article is available online courtesy of t206resource.com. You can read it here. The existence of the Schulte lent legitimacy to the Tinker when collectors were initially skeptical of it.

This is the first Tinker “Chicago” that was discovered in 2011

Schulte front view has always been a favorite of T206 collectors, as evidenced by the premium paid for it over other “commons”. I use quotations around that word because Schulte was an incredible ballplayer. He was one of the elite sluggers of the era and his 1911 season is the stuff of legend. He scored 105 runs to go along with 30 doubles, 21 triples, 21 home runs. He knocked in 107 runs and posted an OPS of .918.

To me, Schulte front view has quite a bit of mystique due to the fact that there are two different 1-of-1s featuring Schulte. The proof is the only one in existence, but it may not even be the most famous Schulte front view front/back combo. One of the biggest mysteries of the T206 set is the Piedmont 350 Schulte Front View. For a long time, it was assumed that Schulte was a 150-Only Subject. When the lone Piedmont 350 was found, it threw that idea out the window. That card is probably the biggest head-scratcher in the entire set in my opinion. It doesn’t fit any pattern, and it’s crazy that only one survived. I wrote an article about that card, titled “T206 Wildfire Schulte Front View Piedmont 350 – Is It a 1 of 1?” which can be read here.

The proof and Piedmont 350 are out of reach for most of us, but we can settle for trying to find a Schulte front view with Hindu or Sovereign 150 backs. Both are quite tough to find, but by no means impossible.

Black and White scan from Lew Lipset’s Encyclopedia of Baseball Cards

T206 Old Mill Back With Interesting “Print Jump”

Luke March 22, 2017

I recently picked up this Claude Ritchey Old Mill. I bought it based on a very small scan, so all I could tell was that the card looked to be in pretty good condition and the background was quite dark. When it arrived in the mail, I immediately noticed the right side of the back. At first I thought the little black lines were some sort of transfer from another card, or possibly foreign ink. Upon closer inspection, it became pretty clear that it was printed at the same time as the rest of the black ink on the back.

I knew exactly who to contact to find out more. I sent an email to my friend Steve Birmingham, who is an expert on printing processes. His reply was so interesting that I wanted to use the info for an article. Steve graciously agreed, so here is our correspondence. I hope you find it as fascinating as I did!

Me: “Have you ever seen this strange “print jump” (for lack of a better term) that happened on the right border of the back of this card?”

Steve:

I haven’t seen that exact thing on Ritchey, but I’m pretty sure I know what it is. I’ve seen another card that’s similar, on Criger there are some Piedmont backs that show the right upper curl of the back duplicated.

There are only a few possibilities for that with lithography. The two I can think of are equally likely.

First option:
The plates were probably laid out using transfers. Like ruboffs only a bit more involved. If the transfer got set down in the wrong spot and they didn’t totally erase it OR if the transfer didn’t adhere properly and they didn’t erase it completely before putting down the replacement, there would be remnants of it that would print.

Second option:
The plates did wear over time, after a certain number of impressions the stone would need to be resurfaced and new transfers laid down. Again, an incomplete resurfacing would leave remnants of the earlier image, and those would print.

At first I thought it was very thin areas that peeled during a soak and got pressed down out of place. But the back only scan shows no sign of it at all.

The stamp guys look to see a second identical copy, as proof that it’s a plate fault and not some printing quirk. There should be another one out there somewhere.

There are ways it could happen as a one time printing error, but they’re all a bit of a reach in the likely/not likely equation.

After receiving this email from Steve, I looked at the other Ritchey Old Mill that I own, and a scan of one I owned previously. Neither had a similar “print jump”. I didn’t find exactly what I was looking for, but I found some interesting marks including three players from the 150-350 series with identical marking on the back in the exact same spot. That may be another topic for a different day.

This next email from Steve is really cool in that he lays out a systematic approach to looking at print marks and oddities. I completely missed most of the marks he references, but they were clear as day when I went back to take a closer look.

Nice pickup, I haven’t seen one before except for the Criger Piedmont.

Finding a second copy is always more difficult on tougher cards, and finding progressive varieties tougher still.

By progressive, I mean something like that Ritchey showing a repaired flaw. The press operator can fix small stuff like that by stoning it off, which is basically using a limestone stick like a crayon to remove the oil attracting image area. That’s probably how the really rare Doyle was created, the error was spotted and the stone fixed during production.

A Ritchey OM that has border gaps where the extra bits of border are would be a probable repair, especially if it had some identical identifier on the front showing it was the same position. There aren’t any of the layout marks at the halfway points of the front border, but there are a couple possible marks that would identify the position as the same one. At the upper left there’s a dark blue heart shaped mark, at the left side of the lower border there’s another blue mark, and there’s a brown spot on the pants at about mid thigh. It’s hard to tell if they’re printed or just random ink spots, but another OM from the same spot on the sheet would probably have at least one of those marks.

A couple bonuses- There are a bunch of other marks on the back that are less obvious, but are spaced as far right from a line as the obvious ones.

And there’s a faint group of marks that don’t fit the OM back that I think are remnants of the P150 scratch. I’ll have to look at the scans I have, but the marks show as lines in the lower left ornament, through the L in large, the top of the B in Base ball, and possibly very faintly in the G above that.

It’s either leftover from the P150 scratch, or is its own damage.

The gray on the front is printed very heavily too. None of the scans on Ebay are good enough for me to tell if it’s a different gray layer than the 150’s, but the sky with the dark blue pattern is almost always a 350 back. (There’s a P150 with that sky on ebay now, but graded A by SGC so it may be rebacked. )

A different Ritchey Old Mill back without the “print jump”

Well, I’m off to go examine all of my 150-350 series Old Mill backs. If I find anything interesting, I’ll be sure to let you know. I want to give a big thanks to Steve for providing the content for this impromptu post. Thanks Steve!