1987 Fleer Glossy Brown backs

[steve B]

That's acid damage from the box breaking down.

And now I know I really need to work on a storage system so I can get my cards out of boxes...

[HasselhoffsCheeseburger]

Damage from the box makes perfect sense. I just can't figure out why other cards not located against a box end would have it.

I've got my Glossy cards that have the brown backs and yet I've opened who knows how many Glossy Update sets and haven't found a single brown back in any of those. Finding a common thread among all of these cards is proving difficult.

Arthur

[HasselhoffsCheeseburger]

And assuming it's damage from the box, wouldn't it be at least somewhat different between the regular cards stored in a cardboard box and the Glossy cards stored in a metal tin?

Arthur

[HasselhoffsCheeseburger]

I ripped another Glossy set. I didn't find a brown back but about one third into the set I found these three cards back-to-back.



It's probably tough to tell from the scan but the Bill Doran has brown on its right edge and a little on its top edge. The front is very off-center in the opposite directions so whatever cards were to the right and above it on the sheet were clearly brown backs. Here's a better view:



So this really confuses matters. I'm not 100% ready to rule out some sort of environmental damage but the evidence is certainly pointing otherwise. The end card in this particular set, with its back against the tin, was a white back. The brown on the Doran matches up perfectly with the amount of off-centering on the front of the card. Plus, it was found well inside the set and surrounded on both sides by white backs.

Yet, why would some portions of a sheet be brown backs and other portions be white backs? That makes almost no sense. Surely there should be uniformity among sheets, right?

I can't make heads or tails of this.

Arthur

[Exhibitman]

I also have an 85 Tiffany Gwynn that is tan uniformly on front. That's the part of the card that is varnished, so maybe it is a varnish issue?

[HasselhoffsCheeseburger]

Adam, you think the sheet was laying on top of another sheet that had too much varnish and it transferred to the backs?

Arthur

[steve B]

That Doran made me wonder if it was a varnish thing, but I'd think the fronts would be obviously yellowed/browned as well if it was the varnish. I do have regular Topps cards that have varnish that yellows (and a few others too), but I'm not sure about the fleer Glossy, or why it would be just certain cards.


I can see it easily being environmental for a first or last card in a cardboard box, or the edges of a whole set in cardboard. But not so much for ones in a tin. Are they in cellophane in the tin? That should sort of protect them from most environmental damage.