Red Man Tobacco issued baseball cards in 1952, 1953, 1954 and 1955, making them the only tobacco company to do so since 1920. For 20 cents you got a pouch of Red Man tobacco and one baseball card. The 1952 to 1955 Red Man Tobacco cards all measured approximately 3 ½ inches by 4 inches with the cutoff tab and 3 ½ inches by 3 5/8 inches without the tab. The cards are very attractive with a large, painted portrait and a short player's bio on the front. On the back is company advertising. 1/2" tabs at the bottom of each card could be exchanged for a prize. The exchange rate was 50 tabs for one free Big League style baseball cap from your favorite team ! The cap's were made of felt with "Red Mans Baseball Cap" on the inside. Cards with their tabs still intact are much, much, harder to find making them more valuable.
Without the tabs it is difficult to determine which year certain players were issued. It is usually easiest to determine the year by looking at the expiration date on the back. Subtract 1 from the expiration year to determine the year of the card.
Each set is made up of 25 players from each league all personally selected by Editor J.G. Taylor Spink of the "Sporting News". Red Man did not waste much effort once they designed their set. They even used the same artwork for players with different backgrounds, year after year, as long as the player did not change teams. If a player changed teams between years, the new team name and logo were "painted over" the old one.
Managers from each league were included in the 1952 and 1953 sets. The 1954 set had four different variations. If you ignore the many variations of the expiration dates, that brings the total to only 208 cards to complete your Master Red Man Tobacco Baseball Card Set.
If you decide to collect I recommend getting one of Bob Lemke's custom
52 Mickey Mantles Red Man cards to add to it.
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