Reconstructing the 1963 Topps 6th and 7th Series Sheets
 

When I originally thought about making this thread I didn't realize how much trouble it would be to make a visual of the sheets, I'm sure it would be much easier for someone who has experience doing that sort of thing. I will start by explaining what I believe is the layout of the sheets. I am certain for both series that the top of the sheet is the yellow based blue inset circle horizontal row, and the bottom 12th row is the red based green inset circle horizontal row upside down. It could be said that the red based green inset circle horizontal row is the top row and the yellow based blue inset circle horizontal row is the bottom row, but I will go with the yellow based blue inset circle row is the top row. I have scans of yellow based blue inset circle cards and red based green inset circle cards that were miscut and show that they were on the top or the bottom of the sheet with no card above or below them. I originally thought the layout of the 12 row sheet consisted of the yellow based blue inset circle row, the yellow based red inset circle row upside down, the blue based orange inset circle row, the blue based red inset circle row upside down, the red based yellow inset circle row, the red based green inset circle row upside down, and then those six rows repeated again. The problem with that is that I was able to find some miscut cards that had small parts of cards from a different color base on them and they were not working out to that pattern. I found a miscut Johnny Blanchard that has a piece of Larry Sherry, a Rusty Staub 4 player rookie card that has a piece of Tom Satriano, and a Steve Dalkowski 4 player rookie card that has piece of the 7th series checklist. So that means that the blue based orange inset circle row butted up against the red based green inset circle row, and the red based yellow inset circle butted up against the yellow based red inset circle row. After a little tinkering, I came up with what I believe is the layout of the rows. It goes yellow based blue inset circle row, yellow based red inset circle row upside down, red based yellow inset circle row, red based green inset circle row upside down, blue based orange inset circle row, blue based red inset circle row upside down, blue based orange inset circle row, blue based red inset circle row upside down, yellow based blue inset circle row, yellow based red inset circle row upside down, red based yellow inset circle row, red based green inset circle row upside down. I was able to find many wrong back 6th series cards that also help explain the layout of the sheets that I will talk about in the next post.

I was able to find many wrong back 1963 Topps 6th series cards which are invaluable to trying to figure which cards were next to which. After looking at many of them I figured out what 1963 Topps wrong backs are, all of them are from sheets that had the whole back sheet printed upside down, which is very understandable considering that half of the cards were upside down on each sheet. I had noticed before that 1963 Topps wrong backs always had the same card on the flip side, for instance Glen Hobbie always has a Rocky Colavito back, Roy Sievers always has Tony Oliva on the back, Harvey Haddix always has Sandy Koufax on the back, Mickey Mantle always has Billy O'Dell on the back, and vice versa. When I figured that out I was able to ascertain with the 6th series wrong back cards that a yellow based blue inset circle card always has a red based green inset circle card on the back, a yellow based red inset circle card always has a red based yellow inset circle card on the back, a blue based orange inset circle card always has a blue based red inset circle card on the back, and then it is also true when the sides are flipped. The card in the upper right corner of the sheet, yellow based blue inset circle Curt Flood, will always have the card from the lower left corner of the sheet, red based green inset circle Jay Hook, on the back of a wrong back card, and the same is true with a Jay Hook front and a Curt Flood back of a wrong back. With that in mind, that is how I came up with how I believe how the rows go on each sheet in this order, yellow based blue inset circle row, yellow based red inset circle row, red based yellow inset circle row, red based green inset circle row, blue based orange inset circle row, blue based red inset circle row, blue based orange inset circle row, blue based red inset circle row, yellow based blue inset circle row, yellow based red inset circle row, red based yellow inset circle row, red based green inset circle row. With this pattern it fits in with every wrong back 1963 card that I saw, in other words a 1963 wrong back always has a front with the back of the card that is in the flipped position of that card on the sheet. These are the backs of some 1963 wrong back cards, they almost always have small parts of other cards and are not centered properly.

I will explain how later, but I now know 23 of the 24 horizontal row edge cards and exactly which rows the manager cards, team cards, four player rookie cards, and the checklists are on. For the 6th series, the yellow based blue inset circle row has Jimmy Coker and Curt Flood as the edge cards and has Harry Craft and the Braves team card. The yellow based red inset circle row has the #509 checklist and the Bill Freehan four player rookie card as the edge cards. The red based yellow inset circle row has the #431 checklist and the Steve Dalkowski four player rookie card as the edge cards. The red based green inset circle row has Joe Azcue and Jay Hook as the edge cards and also contains Al Lopez and the Mets team card. The blue based orange inset circle row has Ruben Amaro and Jim Landis as the edge cards and also contains the Tom Tresh rookie trophy card. The blue based red inset circle row has Daryl Spencer and the Indians team card as the edge cards. For the 7th series, the yellow based blue inset circle row has Ed Sadowski and Don Cardwell as the edge cards and also contains the Cardinals team card and Sam Mele. The yellow based red inset circle row has the Dave McNally four player rookie card and the #509 checklist card as the edge cards. The red based yellow inset circle row has George Banks on the right edge, I haven't figured out the left edge card yet, and also contains the four player rookie cards of Gary Peters and Marcelino Lopez. The red based green inset circle row has Tom Satriano and Orlando Cepeda as the edge cards and also contains Danny Murtaugh and the Tigers team card. The blue based orange inset circle row has Hal Woodeshick and the Rusty Staub four player rookie card as the edge cards and also contains the Pete Rose four player rookie card. The blue based red inset circle row has Dick Hall and Mike de la Hoz as the edge cards and also contains the Willie Stargell and Ron Hunt four player rookie cards.

Great project Cliff. Hope others more talented than myself are able to contribute

It's a crude attempt, but this is how I believe the 1963 Topps 6th series sheet was printed. These are the edge cards of each horizontal row.

The only cards that I have found so far of the 6th series that have parts of two different color based cards are Curt Flood and Steve Dalkowski. The card above Flood is a blue based red inset circle Daryl Spencer, and the card below Dalkowski is the checklist in the yellow based red inset circle row.

great stuff. no sp's.

It's crude and I need to learn how to learn to do better graphics, but this is how I believe the sheet layout of the 1963 Topps 7th series sheet goes, these are the edge cards on each row. I haven't been able to figure out what the left edge card of the red based yellow inset circle row is yet. Sam Mele and the Cardinals team card are on the yellow based blue inset circle row, the four player rookie cards with Gary Peters and Marcelino Lopez are on the red based yellow inset circle row, Danny Murtaugh and the Tigers team card are on the red based green inset circle row, the four player rookie cards of Pete Rose and Rusty Staub are on the blue based orange inset circle row, the four player rookie cards of Willie Stargell and Ron Hunt are on the blue based red inset circle row.

I will break down what I currently have for each of the three 22 card color blocks of the 6th and 7th series 1963 Topps, I will start with the 6th series yellow block. The only cards I have placed are the four edge cards but I know of quite a few cards that are either next to another card or cards that are opposite of each other. On the blue inset circle row I know that Harry Craft-JC Martin-Eddie Kasko are consecutive, on the red inset circle row I know of three pairs of cards that are side by side, Jack Fisher is left of Joe Schaffernoth, Norm Bass is left of Roland Sheldon, Felix Torres is left of Bob Johnson, and these blue inset circle cards are opposite of their red inset circle counterparts, Paul Toth- Ray Sadecki, JC Martin-Felix Torres, Harry Craft-Bob Johnson.

Cliff or others, how would one submit the good work on the 63 high series to beckett to get the publications aligned with the fact that there are no sp's here? Looks like Cliff has nailed them all. So if there is other information that we don't know about driving 1963 sp's let's hear it or go forward with this research as the facts. Hopefully 66 and 67 will play out the same way to identify DP, SP and XSP.

I know I have to have better graphics so I will try it again. I'm nowhere near as savvy as Darren, but this is the best I can do for the time being. This is how I believe the top half of the 6th series sheet is laid out, I will do the bottom half in the next post. I'm almost certain that I know all 11 cards that are in each of the 12 horizontal rows in each series, the problem is knowing exactly where they are placed. It will take more miscut cards being discovered over time. ETA, the sheet splits up on cellphones which I was afraid of. ETA again, I messed up and have 12 spots in the horizontal rows when they should be 11.

This is how I believe the bottom half of the 6th series sheet goes. ETA, the sheet splits up on cellphones which I was afraid of. ETA again, I messed up and have 12 spots in the horizontal rows when they should be 11.

These are combinations that fit together in the 6th series yellow block but I don't know where they are on the sheet.

These are the only combinations I have on the 6th series red block, I don't know where they are exactly on the sheet.

These are combos I have for the 6th series blue block but I don't know where they are on the sheet.

Ain't nobody gonna listen to me, I have to beat my head against the wall to get the Trading Card Database to make minor corrections.

I finally solved something that has been bugging me the last few years. I haven't gotten to it yet, but the one row that I knew the order of most of the cards was the 7th series yellow based blue inset circle row. The only thing I didn't know was the order of the ninth and tenth cards, Billy Klaus and Russ Snyder, but now I do thanks to this eBay auction. It goes Cliff Cook eighth card, Billy Klaus ninth card, and Russ Snyder tenth card. Now I need to figure out the Pagan, Osborne, and Adair cards.

Personally, the 'formal' guides have always seemed to me to mostly publish what certain people want to be true or insisted was true, rather than any formal study using verifiable fact of that which actually is true. Many sets have the wrong dates, many cards marked as rookies are rather ridiculous (how many years did they insist Ruth's rookie was the 33 Goudey?), and SP tags seem to be applied almost at random. It's more time consuming, but I keep my own notes for each set I'm interested in because the published information is so frequently wrong, or unverified and unsupported.

I'll check my 63 set for series 6 miscuts tomorrow.

We have an uncut sheet of 1967 Topps. We just don’t know how many times each card was printed. The SPs and DPs are pretty clear. The 1966 sheet is a work in progress. We can identify a few errors in the lists, but there is still a lot of work to do. 1963 Topps we really don’t know enough to say anything. There are questions that have not been answered and assumptions made without evidence.

Tell me what assumption I have made and I will show what evidence I have. I have miscut and print error cards showing cards from the yellow block blue inset circle row and the red block green inset circle row that were either at the top or the bottom of the sheet. I have miscut cards that contain parts of two different color block cards showing that the blue block orange inset circle row butts up against the red block green inset circle row. You are absolutely correct that the way I have the color blocks laid out on the sheet is speculative, the reason I did that is I was going by how the wrong backs work out. Every wrong back I have ever seen from the 1963 set is simply a card from a sheet that had the back printed upside down, no exceptions. While looking through them I noticed that a yellow block blue inset circle wrong back always has a red block green circle wrong back, a yellow block red inset circle always has a red block yellow inset circle wrong back, a blue block orange inset circle always has a blue block red inset circle wrong back, and vice versa. No exceptions. In order to make this work out, this was the only way I could get the sheets to follow that pattern. The Curt Flood is at the top right corner of the sheet and the Jay Hook is at the lower left corner of the sheet, if you check eBay or WorthPoint it will show a wrong back Curt Flood with a Jay Hook back or vice versa every time. Other than the placement of the 22 card color blocks on the sheet, all evidence clearly shows that each series had 66 cards, there were three different color blocks of 22 cards each, the yellow block blue inset circle row and the red block green inset circle row were on each end of the sheet, the blue block orange inset circle row butted up against the red block green inset circle row, and there are no short prints unless an entire 22 card color block was somehow short printed.

Further explanations are in this thread: https://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=284250. The direct evidence is quite compelling that we are pretty close (well, Cliff is pretty close here!) to establishing the sheet via the miscuts.

This is how I how believe the top half of the 7th series sheet is laid out, I will do the bottom half in my next post.

This is how I believe the bottom half of the 7th series sheet is laid out.

I could be wrong on the layout of the six 22 card color blocks on a 132 card sheet but this works out with all of the evidence I have so far. This Gary Peters rookie card has been a thorn in my side, though. I have it in the red based yellow inset circle row, but for the life of me I can't figure out what card that circle belongs to and it looks like it could be yellow rather than green. That would mean I have it in the wrong row. As of now I have Danny Murtaugh and the Tigers team card in the red based green inset circle row and the four player rookie cards of Gary Peters and Marcelino Lopez in the red based yellow inset circle row. ETA, it can't be a yellow inset circle card above this card because every 7th series red based yellow inset card has the name and position lower than the color circle and that would be visible. It's either a red based green inset circle card or some type of print defect.

On the 7th series yellow based red inset circle row I have these four cards in consecutive order but I don't know where they are on the sheet.

These are combos I have on the 7th series blue block but I don't where they are on the sheet yet. I just found the McLish-Osborne combo today.

And finally, these are the combos I have on the 7th series red block but I don't know where they are on the sheet yet.

Don't want to send your thread off on a tangent, but I'm wondering something. When the 1963 cards were in packs, were they all oriented the 'correct' way? It seems if Topps printed the cards that year with basically half of them upside down, would they have bothered expending the time and capital to make sure the cards were all aligned properly before putting them into packs??

Um...just did a search for unopened 1963 Topps packs, and answered my own question. The video I saw had the cards all over the place, right side up and upside down with no real consistency, so it was just as I imagined it would/should be. Cool.

Interesting, 1986 Topps baseball was printed the same way and I can't remember how they were in packs, but it's been 34 years. It's scary that 1986 is much closer to 1963 than it is to 2020.

Funnily enough I don't remember either and I opened a ton that year.

1986 packaging
 

I'm not sure if this answers your question, but this cello pack has cards in both directions.Attachment 408441

I would think wax and cello packs and vending boxes were the same way, Topps would have to have had full time employees doing nothing else than manually going through hundreds of thousands of cards and making them all uniform. I don’t see that happening.

It didn’t only continue in 1986, it continues even today in many Topps Sets. Upside down cards remain a thing in some issues, especially those with different color borders or partial borders that are presumably still printed the same way they used to be (albeit with much better centering)

Arguably four of the five most sought after 1963 Topps cards were contained in the 22 card blue block on the 7th series sheet, the Pete Rose rookie card, Roberto Clemente, the Willie Stargell rookie card, and the Rusty Staub rookie card. I have figured out who is on each side of the Pete Rose card, it's between Ron Moeller and Johnny Blanchard, but not who is opposite of it or where it is on the sheet. It is on the orange inset circle row. Clemente is the 2nd card on the red inset circle row, has Dick Hall to the left and is opposite of Hank Fischer, I don't know yet who is to the right of him. The Willie Stargell rookie card is the tenth card on the red inset circle row, has Mike de la Hoz to it's right, and is opposite of Don Mossi, I don't know who is to his left. The Rusty Staub rookie card is the 11th edge card on the orange inset circle row, has Hank Fischer to the left, and is opposite of Dick Hall. There is a wrong back Clemente on WorthPoint that has Don Mossi on the back, which works out perfectly into my layout of the sheet if the whole back sheet is upside down. There is a wrong back Pete Rose rookie on WorthPoint but unfortunately it doesn't have a back scan or tell who is on the back.

Cliff, do you have scans of all the cards from the sheets you're trying to recreate?

For the 1966 thread, I ended up downloading virtually all of the high number cards from COMC, and then bringing them into Photoshop to standardize the sizes. It took a crapload of time to make every file uniform (2.7" x 3.8" @ 200 DPI), but now I have a scan of each card at the ready to quickly plug in to the 'uncut sheet' layout document I created. I'd be happy to help with your 1963 sheet(s) effort, but don't have the time to grab all of the scans at the moment.

I searched for sites that I could use to simulate a 11 x 12 sheet, the best I could find was BeFunky's Collage Maker. The only problem is the biggest grid that they have is 6 x 6, which I used two of them combined to make 11 x 6 grids which work fine for home computers but they split up on cellphone screens. The one good thing about it is you can put in any size scan and it will adjust them to the same size. I noticed that you were using COMC scans that are apparently one standard size. If I can find a better site or download better software I would. But no, I don't have the 63's in uniform size, I have scans of miscuts and generic cards in all different sizes from several different sources. I think I need much more card placement before it would be worthwhile for you to make virtual sheets yet, other than one row mainly all I have right now are the edge cards in their proper spot. I have quite a few puzzle pieces that fit together but I don't know where they are exactly on the sheets yet.

With everything going on on the site, I figured I may as well update what new cards I have figured out on the 6th sheet, plus the fact I messed up on my first try on this sheet by having 12 spaces rather than the correct 11. Unlike the 7th series, I have quite a few scans of wrong back 6th series cards. A wrong back 1963 Topps card is actually a card from a sheet that had the whole back printed upside down, so the card on the back is actually the card that is on the opposite end of the sheet. To put it simply, Curt Flood, the card in the top right corner, will always have Jay Hook, the card in the bottom left corner, on the reverse of a wrong back card, or vice versa. This is a work in progress, I may have to switch the two blue rows on the 6th series sheet as I get more information. I have a scan of the back of a miscut yellow based Paul Toth card and the only card that I can find that matches the sliver of a card opposite of it is a blue based orange circle Carroll Hardy, and that doesn't jibe with my current layout. This is the top half of the sheet, I will do the bottom half in my next post. ETA, it splits up on cellphone screens.

This is what I believe is the bottom half of the 1963 6th series sheet. ETA, it splits up on cellphone screens.

Slowly but surely, Gene Green is to the left of Barney Schultz so that means Gene Green-Barney Schultz-Dale Long are consecutive on the 6th series red based green circle row, red based yellow circle Steve Boros is opposite of the Tigers team card which forces the Tigers team card to be in the 7th series red based green circle row as I suspected it was, and I believe I may have found the final edge card I was searching for, which would put the Marcelino Lopez rookie card on the left side of the 7th series red based yellow circle row.

I got the 1963 Topps miscut lot today, the only new one I could make out is Jose Pagan is next to the yellow checklist card in the 7th series yellow based red inset circle row. Unfortunately there isn't enough evidence on the Adair card to make out who is to the left or who is above the Cook and Klaus cards. I was already able to see Cal McLish is the left of Osborne and that Cook-Klaus-Russ Snyder are consecutive in the 7th series yellow based blue inset circle row.

Ken Retzer is below Phil Ortega on the 6th series red based green inset circle row and Cuno Barragan is to the right of Wayne Causey on the 7th series blue based orange inset circle row.

It's tough to find new 1963 or 1966 Topps miscut high numbers anymore, Duke Snider is to the immediate right of Hal Kolstad.

Agreed. as we go through this research some years seem to have had better quality.

great work on the 1963 set.One of the best sets for sure.

I have found a few new 7th series parts of the puzzle, Bill Kunkel is next to Orlando Cepeda and can be placed on the grid, and I was originally convinced that Johnny Klippstein was the sliver next to the Dave McNally rookie card, but after I received the McNally card and scanned it next to a Klippstein card it just didn't jibe. So I went through all of the 7th series yellow based red circle cards again and found that Carl Willey is a perfect match. That works out even better because there is a four card run with Willey that can be added to the grid.

Updated top half of 1963 7th series sheet. ETA, it splits up on cellphones.

Updated bottom half of 1963 7th series sheet. ETA, it splits up on cellphones.

reconstruction of 6th or 7th series
 

Do any of these wrong back cards help?

Attachment 417640

Attachment 417641

Attachment 417642

Attachment 417643

Attachment 417644

Thanks, but I already have them. Wrong back 63’s are very informative, they almost always have parts of abutting cards on the back, and they are always the mirror of the card on the front. A wrong back 63 is always the result of the back being printed upside down, so that means Curt Flood, who is the card in the upper right corner of the sheet, will always have Jay Hook, who is the card in the lower left corner of the sheet, as the wrong back and vice versa. I was able to find quite a few 6th series wrong backs which was very invaluable to laying out that sheet, unfortunately I have found very few 7th series wrong backs. ETA, a 1963 6th and 7th series yellow based wrong back card always has a red based card on the back and vice versa, but a 1963 6th and 7th series blue based wrong back always has a blue based card on the back, which is a huge part of my hypothesis of how the sheets are laid out.

Wayne Causey is opposite of Larry Osborne in the 7th series 22 blue based card block. There are two cards in the 7th series blue based orange inset circle 11 card row that have two different positions on their cards, Wayne Causey and Johnny Blanchard, but it is definitely Causey.