T206 Southern Leaguers

In the T206 set there is a subset of 48 cards of players commonly known as Southern Leaguers. The cards were issued with three different backs; Piedmont 350; Old Mill; and Hindu. Of the three, Hindu backed cards are the rarest and most sought out by collectors.



A while ago I was fortunate to win a lot of 16 Southern League cards in a major auction. Over the course of the next few months I sold off most to other collectors. Shown here is that lot of Hindu backed T206 Southern League cards.

Christy Mathewson, Author

Enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame in its inaugural year (1936) Christopher “Christy” Mathewson (1880-1925) was one of the greatest pitchers of all time. As he began to close in on the end of his baseball career, he began a new life as an author. He wrote children’s books on baseball.

A list of his works:

Won in the Ninth (1910)
A.J. Bodmer Company, New York

Pitching In a Pinch (Boy Scout Edition) (1912)
Grosset & Dunlap, New York

Pitcher Pollock (1914)
Grosset & Dunlap, New York

Catcher Craig (1915)
Grosset & Dunlap, New York

First Base Faulkner (1916)
Grosset & Dunlap, New York

Second Base Sloan (1917)
Grosset & Dunlap, New York

Pacific Coast Biscuit Company

In 1911 the Pacific Coast Biscuit Company of Portland, Oregon issued two series of player cards representing the six teams in the Pacific Coast League. Unlike the E100 cards issued by Bishop & Company during the same year this series of cards have 12 players from each team.

The cards are designated D310 and D311 in the American Card Catalog. The D310’s measure 2 ½” by 4 ¼” and are larger than the D311’s which are tobacco card size.
The cards differ too in that the D310’s have a grayish tone while the D311’s are pastel colored. Checklists appear on the backs for both issues.

While one might think that since are both 72 card sets issued by the same company in the same year that the represented players would be the same this is not the case. For example Buck Weaver appears in D310 but not in D311. It is possible that the D311 may be a 1912 issue rather than a 1911 issue as Weaver went to the Chicago White Sox in 1912 and that may explain his absence from the set. I’ll save that theory for another post at a later time.

E100 Bishop & Co.

This 1911 issue issued by Bishop & Company consists of 30 cards representing teams in the Pacific Coast League, five players each from the San Francisco, Portland, Sacramento, Oakland, Vernon and Los Angeles teams.

The cards are tobacco sized and were issued with green, blue, yellow, red and purple backgrounds.

My interest is in the San Francisco team. Pictured here are Mohler, Powell, Tennant and Sutor. This team subset is only missing the very elusive and very expensive Buck Weaver.

This 1911 set designated E100 in the American Card Catalog followed the 1910 E99 set issued by Bishop & Company. The cards can be differentiated by the Company name on the reverse of the E100’s not appearing on the E99’s. Two types of E100 were issued and the cards are commonly designated as E100 Type I and E100 Type II. The Type II variation are blank backed; were issued only with green and orange backgrounds; and have different captioning.

Bishop & Company also issued a five team set of team cards designated as E221. These are extremely rare.

The Checklist:

T209 Contentnea Color Series

One of my favorite early 20th Century sets is this 16 card set issued by Contentnea Cigarettes. Picturing players in the Virginia, Carolina Association and Eastern Carolina Leagues teams from Goldsboro, Wilson, Raleigh, Rocky Mount, Greensboro and Winston Salem in North Carolina and Spartanburg in South Carolina are represented. While the cards purport to include players of the Virginia League none do.

The pictured cards are from my collection. This is a set I'll work on in the coming years.

There is also a black and white series of T209 Contentnea designated T209-2.

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The Checklist:

Armstrong
Booles
Bourquise
Cooper
Crowell
Crockett
Fullenwider
Gilmore
Hoffman
Lane
Martin
McGeehan
Pope
Sisson
Stubbe
Walsh

T207 Frank "Wildfire" Schulte

1912 Recruit Little Cigars Frank Schulte, Chicago Cubs, For Sale.



Graded SGC 70 Ex+ by Sportscard Guaranty LLC. Offered for $325.00

PC796 Sepia Postcards

One of the larger postcard sets of the early 1900’s this set has been designated as PC796 “Sepia” due to the brownish sepia color of the cards. The manufacturer is unknown though the poses have been used on other sets most notably the Novelty Cutlery set.

Pictured here are the Bresnahan, Brown and Chance cards formerly in my collection.

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The Checklist:

Roger Bresnahan
Al Bridwell
Three Finger Brown
Frank Chance
Hal Chase
Ty Cobb
Ty Cobb, Honus Wagner
Eddie Collins
Sam Crawford
Art Devlin
Red Dooin
Johnny Evers, Germany Schaefer
Sam Frock
George Gibson
Solly Hoffman (Hofman)
Walter Johnson
Nap Lajoie
Bris Lord
Christy Mathewson
Orval Overall
Eddie Plank
Tris Speaker
Gabby Street
Honus Wagner
Ed Walsh

Sporting News Postcards

This small set of six postcards can be dated fairly accurately to 1912 though often they are check-listed as either 1913 or 1912-1915. They are catalogued as either PC757 or M101-3. The only characteristic pointing to an earlier date might be that Bresnahan was dealt to the Cubs in 1912 and Street ended his career in 1912. For all other players the date of 1912 seems right.

Pictured here are the Bresnahan and Cobb cards formerly in my collection.

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The Checklist:

Roger P. Bresnahan
Ty Cobb
Edward Collins
Vean Gregg
Walter Johnson & Charles Street
Marquard