M101 Successful Farming Back

[alanu]

On the M101 Successful Farming back, there are there opportunities to get 50-200 (full set) of these cards for subscriptions amounting to $1 or less.

To me this raises the question as to why full sets or big blocks of cards haven't surfaced.

Any ideas as to why more cards haven't surfaced?


succback.jpg

edited for grammar

[Leon]

I have seen quite a few Successful Farming magazines and advertisements so it is a bit surprising more groups haven't been found. I know there have been other groups of cards (with M101-4/5 backs) found, such as the Indianapolis Brewing, Everybody's and Holmes to Homes, but never any larger groups of these. I always say I think there is still a ton of stuff yet to be found. Maybe a/some of these groups will surface yet....Successful Farming did lots of marketing to sell their magazines.....best regards

[toppcat]

Perhaps not all cards had the ad backs, just some promo cards?

[Matt]

Originally Posted by toppcat

Perhaps not all cards had the ad backs, just some promo cards?

I was thinking along the same lines and it's the only reasonable explanation I can come up with.

[nolemmings]

I have pondered it awhile. Although the promo card explanation is plausible, I think it unlikely. Publisher ET Meredith never missed an opportunity to hawk his magazine. You can find postcards of the Successful Farming company on ebay virtually every day of your life--usually a picture of the plant, but also some that use the pictures featured on the cover of the magazine (Norman Rockwell type illustrations) with some little saying. No shortage there and no reason to think Meredith would let baseball cards go blank when they could just as easily plug his periodical.

Awhile back I was lucky enough to have won some pristine advertising material from Successful Farming in 1916--the year the cards would have been issued. Included were a a cover letter in purple typeset similar to what Leon showed (but with smaller letterhead); a "circular" referenced in that letter for a $1000 cash contest rewarding the person who generated the most subscriptions by April 22, 1916; a flyer with a special penknife offer to those who sold a certain number in fourteen days; an envelope that allowed you to request almost unlimited Successful Farming postcards (see above) to send your friends; a postcard explaining the manner for calculating cash rewards in lieu of the company premiums for subscriptions sold, and, most importantly, the Premium catalog. Alas, not one of these references baseball cards, even though the m101-5 cards would have been printed during this very time period.

Below are the front and back cover of the Spring 1916 Premium magazine and a sample page of some of the goodies that might draw little Johnny's eye. Seems to me that he either lost out to Ma and Pa on where the subcription rewards went, or bought gear instead:

[smtjoy]

It would help explain the large amount of blank back cards out there vs all the others. I do find it pretty easy to find Successful Farming magizines from that time period which would lead me to believe that it was a pretty popular subscruption and they would have mailed a lot of cards. Good question.

[alanu]

Thank you for all the great information.

This 1914 postcard on ebay boasts a circulation of 600,000 monthly, which at the time must have been pretty significant.

http://tinyurl.com/nep98u