Contract High

I don't know if his estate is moving items after his death on June 18th of this year but I expect a bunch of Willie Mays' personal memorabilia to hit the market in the coming years.  One such item is already upon us, although it could have come from a different source-his 1954 contract with Topps, which popped up recently at Mile High Auctions:

Mays started out with Bowman in 1951, was with both them and Topps in '52, then Topps only in 1953 before appearing in both company's 1954 and 1955 sets. He was in the military for most of the 1952 season and all of 1953, so Bowman probably didn't have him locked up on auto-renew like Topps did.  Mays was also buddy-buddy with Sy Berger, and, I believe while unrelated to the events being described here, he holds the record for appearances in the most Topps sets (including inserts and supplemental issues) covering his playing days from 1951-73.

He's card no. 90 in 1954 and you can see he signed his contract on March 8th.  Topps did something weird with the distribution of the set after the first series, so it's not clear if he's a second, third, or fourth series card (or possibly fifth but I'm not positive it went that far in '54) but given how late the date is, he probably wasn't locked up until the third array of cards was being composed. As a reminder, his 1954 card is one of the best ever issued of him:

The back notes his time with Uncle Sam:

The contract itself has enormous historical value of course, but I like how simple the language was. That would change, as would the methods used by Topps to retain players over the years but the other thing I like about it is the signature of Turk Karam, who was employed by Topps as a talent scout and all-around "Sports Dept. guy" before they had an official Sports Dept. 

Mays would earn his only World Series ring with the Giants in 1954 and was the National League MVP to boot-Say hey!

Ten-acity

I got a ping the other day from a collector named Max Brustmeyer who sent along an uncut half sheet scan from the 1955 Topps Rails and Sails set. In addition to being a useful thing in and of itself, the sheet had a surprise in store:

Yes, it's a 10x10 sheet, so there's 100 cards on this slit.  All well and good, but this is a 1955 set and Topps had, from what I know if it, moved to 110 card sheets the year prior, or perhaps I should say a minimum of 110 cards due to the nature of the flip-flops (a method used due to the full bleed tops of each card with Rails and Sails as well). Take a look at this 1954 Baseball sheet offered by Huggins & Scott some time ago now"

If you look at the very tippy-top of the sheet you can see a sliver of another row, which looks to replicate the second row.

So we have a 100 card sheet for Rails and Sails produced well after the (minimum) 110 card sheet containing 1954 Baseball was run.  The 1954 Baseball cards were produced by the Lord Baltimore Press, who were the main printers for the company at the time.  That brings up the question of who lithographed the Rails and Sails sheet.  Was it Lord Baltimore, or perhaps Topps had found their way to Zabel Brothers of Philadelphia in 1955?  

Another interesting thing is the "breakage" of the numbers included on the 1954 Baseball slit and the Rails and Sails slit.  The numbering on the Baseball sheet covers numbers 126 to 150 and then skips to 176 to 250.  The Rails and Sails sheet runs from 1 to 80 (Rails) then jumps to 131 to 150 Sails). The Baseball array is totally arbitrary in 1954 while Rails and Sails in '55 offers two areas of organization: the 4 x 5 block of Sails cards that is partially randomized with the top two rows containing nos. 141 to 150 and the bottom two with nos. 131 to 140, although they are scattered non-consecutively in each row. Below that we get six orderly rows of Rails, or I should say orderly columns as they all run consecutively through a five number top-to bottom sequence that reduces as it moves rightward when viewed from the front.  Namely:

26-30    19-24     13-18     7-12      1-6

Then the right half of the sheet goes back to fifty randomly arrayed cards covering nos. 31 to 80.  Crazy! The wedging of the Sails in the upper left corner is odd as well, it seems like it would be easier, given their full bleed backs and sides on the reverse (which explains why half are upside down) to just extend them out to full rows:

The Rails had no such need for inversion, being uniform in color on the backs:

I've mentioned before it seems like the Sails almost seem like an afterthought, or were originally meant to be a separate issue given how they differ in style so much from the Rails. Perhaps Topps was contracting some expenses in view of their pending offer for Bowman?

Finigan Begin Again and Again....

Sorry folks, formatting issues (still ongoing, apparently, so forgive the crazy quilt of fonts) kept impacting my post about the 1955 Baseball first series slits and the related 1955 Topps Stamp mockup/test.  The first part is now here and the balance below.
 
Here is the section of interest, from the 2,3,4, and 5 columns of the double Spahn sheet:

Related to all this is the 1955 Topps Baseball Stamps test, which was in-house only. I've previously speculated about these noting they came from a 40 subject section of an uncut sheet.  In addition, from those 40 cards (4 x 10 in array) at least one subject is known in every column and row.  The latest checklist I have for the Stamps (2011 Standard Catalog of Vintage Baseball Cards) has two no-prints from the above slits among its listed subjects.  Their list includes 23 subjects, with a 24th, Aaron considered likely by me.  I guess it's possible the stamps came from the other "series" sheet but I kind of doubt it as one of the possible subjects, Wally Moon, is 4x here.  This is why visual checklists are so important, although the Standard Catalog may indeed be correct. 

 

Interesting, no?  Here's the breakdown, noting there are several "One impression" players on it:

1955 TOPPS BASEBALL STAMPS-KNOWN (23)
"CORKY" VELENTINE
"RUBE" WALKER
ALEX GRAMMAS
BILL SKOWRON
BILL TREMEL
BOB SKINNER
BOBBY HOFMAN
CHARLIE WHITE
CHUCK DIERING
DAVE JOLLY 
DON MOSSI
HARVEY HADDIX
HOWIE POLLET
JACK SHEPARD
JIM DAVIS
JIM PENDELTON 
JOE CUNNINGHAM
KARL SPOONER
RAY BOONE
RAY JABLONSKI
RUBEN GOMEZ
STAN HACK
TED KAZANSKI

1955 BASEBALL STAMPS-POSSIBLE (1) HANK AARON

1955 TOPPS POTENTIAL BASEBALL STAMPS-UNKNOWN (16)
ERNIE BANKS - 1
"WINDY" McCALL - 1
DANNY SCHELL - 1
"JAKE" THEIS - 1
BOB BORKOWSKI - 2
DEAN STONE - 1
FRANK HOUSE - 1
BOB MILLER - 
WALLY WESTLAKE -1
JACK HARSHMAN - 1
"DUSTY" RHODES - 1
HANK SAUER - 3
FRED MARSH - 2
CHUCK STOBBS - 2
WALLY MOON - 4
TED WILLIAMS - 3

Numbers = Impressions on slits above.

However, unless a third sheet exists with a different array than the two presently known, it appears the Stamp array was rejiggered from the regular card's sheets by Topps for unknown reasons. I'm working on a full update, which will be posted here as soon as the facts warrant.

Finigan Begin Again

For some bizarre reason, I've never really put together the fact that the two 110 card first series slits are known for 1955 Topps Baseball.  Topps had some interesting things occurring on their press sheets from the inaugural 1952 Baseball set on and things just got weirder each year.  

1952 saw three double-printed high numbers, presumably due to Topps running out of viable players. By the time 1953 rolled around, Topps  had already been in court several times with Bowman (and possibly other companies) and they hedged their bets a little, leaving a five number "punctuated equlibrium" gap as each series went on, backfilling subjects once their contract status was deemed airtight enough, although they got tripped up in the end, with a total of six numbers never being issued.  

1954 saw some interesting gaps and a move to 110 card half sheets (which, forgetting Ferris Bueller's sage advice, I only realized about a month ago, thinking they were 100 card arrays per side for a very long and embarrasing time).  The problem with 1954 is I do not know more than one slit, which had a gap where cards #151-175 did not make the slit.  Although I based that on the idea the known slit was arrayed 10x10 and not 11x 10 I think that gap still holds up. I think Topps did this because the set size went down to 250 cards and, while a plan to keep gaps makes sense, they seemingly had a good enough grip on their players that year it wasn't required.  So the trend was downward on set counts: 407, 274, 250. 

Then we hit the planned 210 card 1955 set, a nadir for sure as Topps went below the Bowman set count for the first time since their direct competition started in '52. Bowman went big of course, issuing 320 cards and going out, on the baseball front at least, in a blaze of glory before their president, John Connelly, decided he wanted nicer things to play with.

As well all know, the 1955 Topps set lost four subjects in the high numbers, possibly printed but either way pulled and never to be identified, landing at a final count of 206 and making me think Mr. Connelly was still contemplating his next moves, which I don't think even he fully knew until the 1955 Bowman Football set got bum rushed by Topps. Here are the two "first series" slits and you will soon realize why I used quotation marks.

Here is the first slit, I think it's the "A" slit but but am not positive as there are no markings:

(courtesy Love of the Game Auctions)

At least one other sheet with this array is known.  The other slit, let's call it "B" but also the "double Spahn" for what will be obvious reasons:

That was posted over at Net54 not too long ago.  It looks so clean I thought it could be a digital recereation (and it very well may be) but this extremely old REA lot shows what I believe is the same sheet, as you can clearly see two Spahns stacked up in the lower right, even with the grainy shot (it was their June 25, 1993 auction).  While it's likely enhanced by whoever shot the original, the Aaron to the right of Spahn and Ted William in the lower right corner of the REA sheet nicely confirms this sheet array is legit:

Also of interest, the backs on the LOTG sheet are misligned!  At a guess, knowing that Topps printed the backs first, the  Love of the Game sheet was likely a test for the obverse colors. Ordinarily, I'd say there's a chance the double Spahn sheet array was altered prior to final printing but a miscut card of ol' Warren, as noted in the Net54 thread, proves otherwise:

The proof is on the reverse, as the miscut stat line is clearly Spahn's:

In the thread on Net54, it's also noted a "double" miscut Hodges exists!  He's #187 in the set as a high number, so Topps was clearly doing it on purpose (more below on this). Now, let's count together, from most to least:

FIVE IMPRESSIONS (1)

70           ROSEN

FOUR IMPRESSIONS (15)
14           FINIGAN             
23           PARKS  
29           WEHMEIER        
31           SPAHN 
58           RIVERA
59           ALLIE    
61           JACOBS
62           KIPPER 
67           MOON 
80           GRIM   
81           CONLEY 
84           PASCUAL            
86           WILSON               

THREE IMPRESSIONS (30)

2             WILLIAMS           
3             FOWLER               
7             HEGAN 
8             SMITH   
10           KEEGAN               
16           SIEVERS 
18           KEMMERER        
19           HERMAN             
24           NEWHOUSER     
26           GROAT 
30           POWER 
32           McGHEE               
33           QUALTERS           
34           TERWILLIGER     
36           KIELY     
39           GLYNN  
45           SAUER  
49           PORTER 
57           O'DELL  
63           COLLINS               
64           TRIANDOS           
66           JACKSON             
72           OLSON  
77           PORTOCARRERO              
78           JONES   
82           HARMON            
83           BREWER               
89           FRAZIER               
100         IRVIN    
106         SULLIVAN           

TWO IMPRESSIONS (15)

5            GILLIAM            
11           FAIN      
13           MARSH 
20           CAREY   
25           PODRES               
40           HOAK    
41           STOBBS 
47           AARON 
50           ROBINSON          
54           LIMMER               
55           REPULSKI             
74           BORKOWSKI       
90           SPOONER            
103         WHITE   
105         DIERING               

ONE IMPRESSION (35)

1             RHODES               
4             KALINE 
6             HACK     
9             MILLER 
12           THEIS     
17           HOFMAN             
21           GRAMMAS         
22           SKOWRON          
27           GRADNER            
28           BANKS  
37           CUNNINGHAM 
38           TURLEY 
42           McCALL 
43           HADDIX 
44           VALENTINE         
46           KAZANSKI           
48           KENENDY             
52           TREMEL                
53           TAYLOR 
56           JABLONSKI          
60           STONE  
65           BOONE 
68           DAVIS   
69           BAILEY  
71           GOMEZ 
73           SHEPARD             
76           POLLET 
79           SCHELL  
85           MOSSI  
87           HOUSE  
88           SKINNER              
102         WESTLAKE           
104         HARSHMAN       
107         ROBERTS              
108         WALKER               

ZERO IMPRESSIONS (14)

15           PENDLETON       

35           JOLLY     
51           HUGHES               
75           AMOROS            
91           BOLLING              
92           ZIMMER               
93           BILKO    
94           BERTOIA              
95           WARD   
96           BISHOP 
97           PAULA  
98           RIDDLE  
99           LEJA       
110         ZERNIAL               

It looks like Topps plugged in both the puncuated equilibrium and consecutive number gap processes at the same time in 1955! Nos. 15, 35, 51, 75 and 110 from the former method and nos. 90-99 using the latter, with 14 "no prints' resulting.  There's a lot of single prints and even a 5x player in Al Rosen, so clearly whatever the next "series" was should have included these, perhaps leaving some gaps they hoped to fill in, until the last series came and they were bereft of any further subjects, leaving 175, 186, 203 and 209 to never see the light of day. Presumably some of the 2x prints were trued up a bit as well but that's not a guarantee. Given the "divide by 5" look to the tranches (and Rosen plus the zeroes add to 15) it looks pretty well planned out to me, even though the arrays are all over the place. Just look how parts of a couple columns repeat elsewhere, the random placements like Spahn and the plethora of single prints.

APOLOGIES: There is some kind of weird formatting problem going on with this post.  Please see the continuation of it here.

The Wisdom Of Solomon

There were some super sweet Topps related items up for bid in the just concluded Legendary Auction for September 2014.  Over a dozen lots featuring Match Print photos taken by William Jacobellis have turned up and while only a scant few feature Topps images, they come with an added bonus, namely the scrawled approval of Ben Solomon, who was Woody Gelman's ad agency partner and at some point became the Topps Art Director.

The Match Prints are from the 1954 and 1956 sets.  Here is Larry Doby's, featuring both the main photo (with classic Yankee Stadium centerfield background) and the inset:

You can clearly see the "Ben Sol" OK on the reverse of each.  Pretty neat!

Here is the finished product:

Topps clearly was concerned with quality control and appears to be avoiding the use of wire photos to create their cards. Someone did a real nice job colorizing the main photo as well; art was a true art form in the 50's!

On a related note, I have not yet been able to figure out when Ben Solomon went to work for Topps as an employee.  While his Solomon & Gelman partner Woody worked on the 1952 Topps baseball set and is said to have joined the firm around that time (late 1951), I am not so sure.  Solomon & Gelman lived on until at least 1957 --and possibly even as late as 1962-- from what I have been able to find and they may have been taken in house by Topps before finally hiring on at some point.

I do note Jacobellis had an address fairly close to Solomon & Gelman's (230 W 41 St at one time before they moved three or four blocks north). There were probably dozens of commercial photographers in Manhattan at that time.  I wonder if this guy was one of them?

Here is a Net54 thread on Jacobellis and some other vintage era photographers that is well worth a look.

Full Disclosure

After winning the bidding war for Ted Williams in 1954, Topps wasted no time in promoting their catch-Williams led off the 1954 Baseball issue with card #1 (he would later close out the set at #250 as well).

While compelling Bowman to pull their own card of Teddy Ballgame, Topps featured Williams on their box design in 1954:

That is the Canadian version of the box. Many unopened packs and surviving boxes emanate from up North-you have to be vigilant when buying or bidding on Topps items from the 1950's as many sellers do not alert consumers to this fact. Thanks to Friend o'the Archive Ken Meyer, who provided scans for the Archive today, an interesting "extra" has been uncovered as well.  Check out this empty one-cent box:

Your get twice the expected Splendid Splinter on the topper! I really love the way Topps extended the artwork on this one-totally unnecessary but very, very cool.

54=52?

I got a real interesting bunch of scans and information over the mojo wire recently from Friend o'the Archive Ken Meyer. I'll post bits and pieces here and right now want to focus on the one of the more interesting tidbits, a 1952 Topps high number pack that held a big surprise.

You may recall the 1952 "second" series of high numbers had it's own color scheme, which was discussed here yonks ago. Well Mr. Meyer has opened a pack that held six 1954 Topps baseball cards within (plus gum, plus the ad insert.  The pack had the 1952 copyright so I have to wonder if this was a very early rewrap by Topps (assuming the pack was untampered with, which I am leaning towards based upon the other, drool-worthy scans he sent). Here is the opened pack:

I'm working on getting a scan of the contents, which I will post when received.

1954 Where Are You?

If there is one book that really propelled me into studying the myriad issues of Topps Chewing Gum, the 3rd edition of the Sport Americana Baseball Card Price Guide (Beckett 3) is it.



To be fair, everyone calls these "Beckett" books but Denny Eckes was the man behind the card research and Dr. Jim was the numbers guy; Beckett just had a better PR machine! As an aside, I received a very informative e-mail from Mr. Eckes' daughter after he had passed away, which led me to the conclusion he was an extremely nice and gentle man with an unabiding love of the hobby.

Within its pages were some great shots of rare cards in full color and, more intriguingly to my oddly focused nineteen year old mind, an article on old Topps uncut sheet quadrants from 1952 and a 100 card '54 sheet. The '52 sheet (high numbers, no less) captured my attention to be sure, but the writeup on the '54 sheet did not take hold for a while. Then one day, after sussing out a '67 high number sheet from a hobby article (remember, "oddly focused") I decided to work up the '54 sheet array from the photo in Beckett 3. What I found was that the numbering ran from #126-150 and #176-250. This left me somewhat nonplussed.

(from www.baseballtoddsdugout.com )

This is Sy Berger's favorite set by the way.

Now, did they issue packs with cards from only one 100 card half-sheet or were they mixed together? Mark Murphy's Unopened Pack, Wrapper & Display Box Guide details a fifteen card '54 cello pack with cards in the "4th" series, which could mean it spanned both sheets (see below). Unless a lot of '54 nickel or cello packs are opened someday (unlikely as so very few exist) we may never know.

The penny packs would not reveal the answer but their wrapper looks nice!



This is how the hobby papers and guides viewed the 1954 Topps series years ago, note the span of series 4:

Series	Cards
1	1-50
2	51-75
3	76-125
4	126-175
5	176-200
6	201-250

Current thinking is that 1-50, 51-75 and 76-250 are three distinct series, with the middle being almost twice as valuable as the other two. I am not so sure about that. I think there were only two series: 1-50 and then all the rest came out in one big whoosh, possibly staggered geographically but maybe just box to box.

What is pretty cool though, is that some of the glass printing plates from the sheet shown in Beckett 3 still exist and were auctioned a little while back. These were described as from Lord Baltimore Printing, in Baltimore, MD. Half of the sheet is represented. Note how every other row is flipped due to full color bleed top borders:



Some detail of the glass plate:



Not quite sure what this was, maybe copies of the cards on the glass plate?




For those who are interested by such arcana, Topps baseball cards from 1952-54 were printed on 100 card half-sheets (UPDATE 5/5/25: 110 as it turns out), in 1955 they were most likely printed on either 100 or 110 card half-sheets (possibly the first series was on 100 then the size changed to 110 for later series) before converting to the standard 132 card half-sheet in 1957 for the new, smaller (yet "standard") sized cards. 132 card half-sheets were used during the entire post '56 Topps vintage era for their annual sets, in arrays of twelve rows with eleven cards per row.

Now if I could just find that other '54 half sheet.........