Originally Posted by G1911
Too much potential to let this thread die already.
Here's a cool one I have on my desk. For some reason, the majority of unique-oddities in T220 are of Joe Coburn, over 50% of what I've seen are his card. There's a couple really cool yellow proof/incompleted cards that I don't have. I like the mystery of it, the odd removal of the generic man-to-left that seems to be completely pointless.
Top Row, the Silvers:
Here's an incomplete T220 with a blank back and no name on bottom. SGC slabbed this as a proof, which I do not believe is accurate. I think it more likely this is just from a scrapped sheet.
Second card is a normal silver, except... there's almost no silver. There are just a few flakes here and there of the silver coating, and his name is printed twice in a very bold way. I cannot be sure if this card was screwed up in printing or some kind of damage occurred over the years. I've owned some really beat up, exposed and nasty T220-1's and never found one with this kind of damage, nor have I for a similar ATC card. I'm 50/50 agnostic on if this card left the factory this way at the moment. I am pretty confident these two cards are a clue to the printing of the name. I have some cards where the name is clearly printed below the silver, others where the black ink name is clearly printed on top of the silver. The evidence does not all point the same direction, to the name being printed with the original black pass, being printed after the silver application, or being printed twice. SGC slabbed this one a 10, which seemed wrong. It should be an A, either because it's been altered or because it's an incomplete card.
The third card is a correct, final silver card.
Row 2, The White Errors:
Again, not sure if some kind of pre-production piece or from a scrapped sheet. The card is handcut, and has an upside down back of Joe Gans. This is probably significant as a clue to sheet layout. Gans was the 3rd of 5 cards on the right side of the sheet in the Silver run. Coburn cannot be placed because his Silver sheet does not exist or has not yet appeared. This may suggest that, for him to be printed upside down here, Coburn was on the left edge of the sheet. It is also possible the type 2's have no relation to the layout of the type 1's, though that would seem to create unnecessary work for Brett Lithography to achieve nothing by rearranging everything. It seems likeliest there were 2 sheets for T220-2. This card is certainly from the early print run, if not from a test/proof run. The man to Coburn's left has been removed but appears as a blue haze, which indicates it is from early production before the image was edited again.
The next card is a fully printed and produced blue haze man-to-left. These cards are pretty darn tough, though recurring. They so far have only been discovered with 649 backs. I suspect the first printings were Mecca 649, though not all Mecca 649's were produced before all Mecca 30's. Tolstoi appears to have been issued significantly later.
Row 3, the boring ones:
A Mecca 30, Mecca 649 and Tolstoi back cards with the normal removal of the man at left, where he can faintly be seen in black, not a blue haze.
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