I recently completed another trade with John, a reader of this blog and a fellow Phillies baseball card collector. Solely based on the Phillies doubles he has available and the impressive nature of his wantlists, I imagine that John's Phillies baseball card collection must be amazing. He recently put together his Phillies wantlists from the 2000s, and I was more than happy to help him out with his pursuit of new-ish Phillies cards.In return, I got a whole mess of old-ish Phillies cards. Most of the older Phillies cards are in lesser condition, but John did a great job pointing out their minor flaws before shipping them along to me. Frankly, I've become less and less condition-sensitive as I get older (and wiser) and I was thrilled to add a bunch of Phillies cards from the '50s, '60s and '70s to my collection.
Three of the cards in John's package were my first "Exhibit" cards. I wasn't familiar with these cards, so a bit of research was in order. According to the Standard Catalog, the Exhibit Supply Co. of Chicago released these oversized cards between 1947 and 1966, issuing some of the same cards over several years in a row in some instances. All told, there are 336 unnumbered variations of these cards produced over the twenty-year span.I found this handy dating chart, which helped me determine that the Del Ennis card was most likely first issued in 1947. The "MADE IN U.S.A." on the bottom right is exactly a half inch across. The Richie Ashburn card is actually an error variation (his first name is misspelled on the card) and was first issued in 1950. On both the Ashburn card and the Whiz Kids team card, "MADE IN U.S.A." is exactly 7/16th of an inch across. (Click on any of the cards to enlarge.)
I scanned the complete 336-card checklist and there appears to be at least two dozen (maybe more) Phillies in the 1947-1966 Exhibits set. (Hopefully 14,000 Phillies will insert a comment to this post with a Phillies checklist - hint, hint.)
Thanks again for the trade John!
Actually Jim, the first Exhibits set came out in 1921 and ran right up through the years. They are some of my favorite cards especially the older ones.
ReplyDeleteVery cool. Just sent you an e-mail about an old book I just pulled out that contains Phillies checklists for all the pre-war and Exhibits cards. Putting together a pre-war wantlist and updating my older oddball wantlists could be an excellent offseason chore.
ReplyDeleteThere are plenty of Exhibit cards issued through the years 1921-1976. What you referenced from the Standard Catalog in your post was just the 1947-1966 series. I never found a checklist for the Phillies cards in that series, so all I have is a partial list based on what I've been able to confirm through my own research. I'll send you an email later today with a complete list of Exhibit cards that I am aware of -- to the best of my knowledge, I have complete information on all cards through the late 1930s.
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