Quote:
Originally Posted by Moonshot Moose
I recently picked up a 1921 W516-2-1 Grover Alexander (Hand Cut, SGC Authentic), and I noticed something unusual about it. The background on this example is almost entirely black, unlike the typical colored backgrounds (red, green, blue, etc.) that I’ve seen on other W516 cards.
My question is:
Were any W516 cards actually issued with all-black backgrounds, or is this more likely a print defect / over-inked sheet / toning issue?
Has anyone else seen similar dark or black-background variations in the W516 set?
Appreciate any insight or scans from fellow collectors for comparison.
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Print runs for W516 baseball got cheaper as time went on, eventually cutting the number of different colors down to one or two. Several players _are_ known in all-black and all-blue, including yours. I've seen maybe 15-20 total in that style and consider them tough to find.
There's a good chance these one-color cards came out sometime after 1922 and proved "successful" enough that the W516 maker (Universal Toy & Novelty Co. of Illinois) took a similar approach when designing their larger 1925 team sets, which also stuck to single colors. I think using one color saved money and helped minimize printing errors.
Here's a similar W516 Hornsby with heavy black ink and (light) layer of red. You can see by the dates along its top edge that it was printed below a strip of US presidents and Teddy Roosevelt (1901-09) in particular. That implies heavy black ink versions for at least those two subjects.
In short, I think one-color cards were an effort to save Universal Toy some time and money when printing. Hope that helps!