[Jason]

Hello everyone. Bear with me as I know this post is a bit long winded. It is a subject I have thought about often and one that does not have a definitive answer like so many things in the Pre-War vintage hobby. That being the T210 Orange Border error subset. Here is a little something I wrote on the subject. This is just my personal opinion on the creation of these cards and I welcome feedback and alternative theories. Basically I just want to get to the bottom of these error cards any way I can. Thanks in advance for any comments, suggestions, information, etc.



T210 Orange Border Theory

The 1910 Old Mill Cigarette's T210 set comprises of 640 total pose's covering eight different Minor League affiliates of the Deadball Era of professional baseball. Amongst the different leagues represented in the set of cards is the Texas League, known as the 3rd Series in the T210 set. There are 95 cards in this Series alone and it boasts future MLB players such as Hank Gowdy, Sandy Burk, Jeff Tesreau and many others who experienced the dream of playing MLB Baseball. Even Everett Hornsby, Rogers' brother makes a appearance. Here are the teams that where included within the Texas League and their corresponding divisional records for the year 1910:

Regular Season Standings


Dallas Giants 83-57
.593

Houston Buffaloes 82-58
.586

San Antonio Bronchos 74-62
.544

Fort Worth Panthers 75-63
.543

Shreveport Pirates 75-66
.532

Galveston Sand Crabs 64-75
.460

Oklahoma City Indians 63-74
.460

Waco Navigators 38-99
.277


Courtesy of Baseball Reference. The Image wouldnt upload.







It was a pretty competitive league that year. Which brings us to the cards themselves. As mentioned, the checklist has 95 different player poses. With a well known Orange Border subset comprising 20 of the players represented in the original 95 Red Border examples a "Master" Series 3 set would technically be 115 cards. I have no knowledge if anyone has ever finished the T210-3 Master set but, I can confirm one is close to being completed by myself.

For those uninitiated with the T210-3 Orange Border subset, I will attempt to explain the consensus amongst the hobby community I was told when I first heard about these factory error cards. The story goes that during the end of the printing process the ink started to run low and the bright red borders were printed orange for the last few sheets of cards. 20 different players have been confirmed to have Orange Borders of the original 95 cards in the Series. I believe this to be an accurate number. It does speak to the sheet size printed as the 20 subjects might have been the sheet count or possibly it was double printed with two of each player for a count of 40 per sheet. Either way, they are vastly different from their red brothers in border color but identical in every other way. Except for one card, which is the basis for my theory on the creation or better yet the printing process of these cards.

Like everyone else, I believed these to have been created in the latter part of the printing process. That is, until I had posted a thread discussing them on Net54. Towards the end of the conversation, a fellow collector mentioned the missing A on the Series 3 Red Border cards of Jones from the end of the Oklahoma team designation. I had this card and was aware of the missing A and then compared it to my Orange Border Jones which did, in fact, have the A on the end of Oklahoma. Interesting. This prompted my thinking that maybe we have this all wrong, that the Orange Border cards were printed first. Possibly, it was done in an ink mixing error at the beginning of the printing process. The missing A is a huge key to this theory. Here is what I think may have happened.

We all know of famous printing plate accident/ errors. The T206 set is riddled with cards where the plate is rumored to have been damaged or just not striking correctly. Such as, the Nodgrass and Shappe errors. I believe the T210-3 Jones missing A card falls into this category. My theory is the first batch of Series 3 card's printed were in fact Orange due to an ink mixing error. Perhaps, they tried to add some ink to the batch resulting in the few yellow border T210s that have been confirmed. After coming to the conclusion they had to start over with a fresh batch to achieve the red ink desired, they of course had to clean the plates off from the orange/yellow ink. During this process I believe the Jones plate may have been damaged or the A obstructed in some way. Which would account for the missing A in the subsequent printing of the red bordered card's that account for the majority of the known Series 3 cards.



Of course this is just my opinion and likely can never be proven. I have started to research T210 printing and the factories the cards and the cigarettes themselves were produced in. Hopefully one day a answer will come about and advance this theory. If not its still a fun subject to think about. This is a great hobby we all share and it's been so much fun especially as of late. See you all at the National in 2017!