Tag: Doc White

Doc White: Hidden in Plain Sight

In November 2014, Erick Summers made an amazing discovery.  In a large lot being offered by Heritage Auctions, hiding in plain sight, was a true T206 gem.  Unlike the typical “find” story, luck had nothing to do with this one.  I hadn’t talked to Erick for awhile and I always liked the way he approached collecting T206s.  I wanted to write an article about this find of his, so I decided to reach out to him and see if he wanted to collaborate on it with me.  What follows is Erick’s recollection of the series of events that led to this important T206 discovery:

Written by Erick Summers 

I’ve always been on the hunt for hidden T206 treasures, hence my net 54 moniker of T206Hound.  I thought I had found an “uppy” (as my good friend Johnny calls them) in July 2013 in a Joe’s Vintage Auction:

http://jvscauctions.com/LotDetail.aspx?inventoryid=3868

http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=173776

That disappointment didn’t deter me as I continued hunting… trolling the auction sites and eBay daily looking for what others might overlook.  I checked out the November 2014 Heritage auction as soon as it opened.  It had several large T206 lots and as usual I poured over the images of each and every one.  One particular lot immediately grabbed my attention as I could quickly tell that had some graded HOFers, a green Cobb, an over-sized Pattee and two cards with a partial name at top.  Always looking for two namers, I zoomed in but immediately saw that they were double names.

The next scan showed the backs and one of the cards showed a mis-cut back that I knew I had seen before.  While the back of the card was shown right-side-up, I knew that there was a upside down Doc White with an identical “miscut.”  Was this really what I thought it was?  For it to be an upside-down back, that means that the photographer would have had to place the cards face up, take the photo and then turn them all over.  Then the card wouldn’t be aligned and the photographer would have to rotate it 180 degrees to match the others.  Did this person not realize that the card was unique, or was my hypothesis incorrect?

It didn’t take me long to find an image of the card I remembered seeing on Net54:

Having to keep this discovery to myself for three weeks was going to be tough.  I also knew that a lot of this size with a Cobb and several HOF was going to bring in a pretty hefty price even with the prospect of this hidden gem being included.  I really don’t recall the bidding process on this, but I was ecstatic when I won.  But then I started to question whether the card was what I thought it was.  If I was wrong, I likely overpaid for the lot.

The next few days were nerve-racking.  I wired money to Heritage and waited for the package to ship.  When it finally arrived I called Johnny as I opened the box.  The top card in the package was the White.  I turned the card over and hunch had paid off.  I was holding an “uppy!”

As with most of my discoveries, the hunt was the exciting part.  I needed to sell this unique card to pay for the lot.  The Philly Show was soon after and I consigned it to Al Crisafulli who had it graded by SGC at the show.  I had nearly as much fun watching the bidding on my consignment.  While it didn’t reach the price I was hoping, I can still recall the joy I had in the discovery.

Written by Erick Summers 
Links:

https://loveofthegameauctions.com/LotDetail.aspx?inventoryid=4565

https://sports.ha.com/itm/baseball-cards/lots/1909-11-t206-white-borders-partial-set-97-with-hofers-and-print-errors/a/7120-

80264.shttp://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?

 

Huggins and Scott Auctions off Three T206 Mis-cuts from the same Piedmont 350 Sheet

Huggins and Scott recently sold this very interesting trio of mis-cut Piedmont 350 backs.  The lot, which ended on February 8, 2018, sold for a final price of $840 after the juice.  Though they were not advertised as such, these three cards all came from the same sheet.

I don’t have firsthand knowledge of the provenance of these cards.  However, I believe they may be Printer’s Scrap.  This means that they were not included in packages of Piedmont Cigarettes, and instead left American Lithographic Company with one of the printers, or were discarded and saved by someone else.

The fact that they are so severely mis-cut is the first clue.  By itself, that doesn’t really tell us much though.  The second clue is the condition of each card.  They are all in very nice, uniform shape.  The third clue is the presence of both Seymour and Cicotte in the group.  The pink print marks below connect Seymour and Cicotte, proving they were right next to each other on a Piedmont 150 sheet.  We don’t know for sure that the layout remained the same for Piedmont 350 sheets, but it’s another piece of circumstantial evidence, all of which points in the direction of these three cards being printed on the same sheet.  To read more about the Seymour-Cicotte connection, and Piedmont 150 sheets in general, check out the links at the bottom of this article to other articles I’ve written on the subject.

The final clue is that all three cards came from the same collection.  It would be hard to imagine these three cards looking as similar as they do without them having been stored together for many years.  In the same vein, it would be hard to imagine them being released in packages of Piedmont Cigarettes and eventually making their way into the same collection without exhibiting different levels of wear.  However, there’s always the chance that these three cards were inserted into one carton of cigarettes and a few packs were purchased by the same smoker.

There are other examples of similar cards floating around in the hobby.  They are often referred to as “no name” cards because they are mis-cut in such a way that the caption has been cut off.  If I saw just one of these cards by itself, I wouldn’t jump to the conclusion that it was Printer’s Scrap.  Though they are severely off-center, they are certainly factory-cut.   The vast majority of cards that we refer to as “Printer’s Scrap” will exhibit rough, hand-cut edges because the cards were scrapped as a full sheet, and cut up by hand.  There’s no way to know for sure, but my guess is the sheet these three cards were printed on did not pass quality control (for obvious reasons) and the cards were never inserted into packs of Piedmont Cigarettes.

In the next couple of weeks, I’ll delve deeper into these topics.  Writing about these three cards (which may or may not be scrap) made me realize I haven’t written anything about the topic on this site yet.  So, next week’s article will be an overview of T206 Printer’s Scrap.  I’ll define the term, talk about all the different kinds, and show off some really cool examples.  Two Sundays from now, we’ll take a look at other examples of T206 sheet-mates that have survived together all these years.

Links and Sources:

Pat Romolo’s T206 Piedmont 150 Plate Scratch Project (Part 1/2)

Pat Romolo’s T206 Piedmont 150 Plate Scratch Project Part 2/2

What I Have Learned from Pat Romolo’s Piedmont 150 Plate Scratch Research: Part One

What I Have Learned from Pat Romolo’s Piedmont 150 Plate Scratch Research: Part Two

What I Have Learned from Pat Romolo’s Piedmont 150 Plate Scratch Research: Part Three

What I Have Learned from Pat Romolo’s Piedmont 150 Plate Scratch Research: Part Four

https://hugginsandscott.com/cgi-bin/showitem.pl?itemid=25159&catid=135&lotno=412