How easily have people been able to come across these? At least for me..I rarely see them on ebay...I feel they are harder to find than what some resources actually say about them. I also feel prices on them are somewhat unknown...or flexible at best.

By the way...Leon, are anyone else in Texas...is it true these cards still pop up more often in Texas?

As a relative "amateur" in the hobby I have always thought these were scarce but not rare, whatever that means. With that being said there are subsets of Mello-Mints, relative to their scarcity, imo. Some, like Bescher, Knight (I think), Lajoie, and a few others ...are seen often, while others are almost never seen. In that respect they are sort of like Tango Eggs cards. As for them being found more in Texas, than other places, I have not seen that be the case in my short tenure in the hobby. I am sure others know far more than I and I hope they will chime in...best regards

Interesting...I realize they aren't E107's...but putting a set together of Mello Mints none the less would seem to be pretty darn difficult. I believe it was old cardboard that said they were found more often in Texas..but I don't know how old that information is either.

Hope So....I'm Lookin' fur'em

Life's Grand,
Denny

That is funny Denny....I swear I've seen that Knight card in PSA 7 several times on ebay...unless it's the same exact one that keeps coming up for auction. How long have you had that one?

Nope,
Different one! & the funny thing is I think there's only 2 7's...I'm gonna check now..

Denny

It seems like every time i stumble across a mid to high grade mello mint its Knight. Maybe someone had a Knight horde kept in nice shape? who knows

Dave,
PSA's Pop has Four 7's...

Denny

And there is probably what....no other's with even 2 7's?

not knowing much about the set....

Along the lines of what Leon mentioned....
what is the theory on some players having a bunch of known examples.... and others very few?

the often seens, and the never seens

Maybe people are sitting on the lowest grade-pop ones, and they will show up at some time?

is there a prevailing theory?

Joe...not sure. I've owned one of these...it was raw, not slabbed...For the life of me with how thin and frail the cards are...I don't know how any would be available in high grade. The one I had anyway, almost seemed like the card was from the same type paper used for newspapers...really that thin and flimsy. Maybe mine was just extra beat to hell.

There are 50 Player cards in the set. Only 30 Players out of the 50 Players were graded by PSA. With a total of 86 of them having been graded. 14 of them were Cy Young, another 14 being Jack knight and 9 of them being Bescher. Jack knight has 4/7's, 7/6's, 1/5 & 2 in the 3-4 catagory. Seems Jack & Cy dominate the known cards in the set. Cy has Zero 7's, 1/6 & 5/5's. The rest have very few examples, most being in VG Condition. SGC has graded just a hand full, with an added not that One Jack Knight has been graded an 80. So Jack does seem to rule this set. Why?, Is a very good question!

Note: The set is comprised of a series of 50 players. As indicated on the back of each card, one card was issued with each 5-cent package of Smith's Mello-Mint gum. A horizontal crease and the paper-thin stock used for each card indicate that the cards were folded before insertion into the gum pack.

Dave is so right bout them being extremely thin. How any of these ever lasted 96 years is truly remarkable. I am just begining to Hunt for these delicate pieces of history. Ive been told that No One Has Ever Been Able To Put This Set Together!?!?! Yet Jack has at least 15 Known Great Lookin' Examples, Very Interesting Stuff.

Theory of the Day! Jack had a Fan who collected and Protected them, Then they were freed from the Currier who nurtured them... How else could one explain His Dominance?

But what do I know,
Denny

This is the one I had Denny...

After reading the T206 Wagner thread, I think I have solved this riddle.

There is really only ONE Mello-Mint Knight card in existence and only ONE Mello-Mint Young card in existence...

but the owners keeps trimming and re-trimming them over and over...

and then unslabbing them and submitting them to PSA over and over in search of that elusinve PSA 8 grade that the trimmed Wagner card received!!

About 3-4 years ago I bought about 55 Mello-Mints from another dealer included were a glut of Knight and Bescher along with about 6 more players in multiples. At the time I split the group up fairly evenly and sent half to SGC and half to PSA, if you look at both of their pop reports you will see that is the card with the most graded. None graded higher that NRMT save for 1 that made SGC 86 that I recently sold to a major collector. Shortly after that I bought 5 or 6 Cy Youngs from the same person, their grades ranged from a 6-3. ALL have now been sold into the hobby.

Scott

Mark Macrae picked up large group of these back around 1989 or 1990. I remember there beeing a large number of Lajoie and Young cards. I bought Lajoie, Young, Bescher and Hartzell from him. All cards were in great shape and without the crease down the middle.

Jay

I love pinatas. You get to beat the crap of something and get rewarded with candy.

i've had all of 2 mello mints, and they were both jack knight...i had a PSA 6 (now gone) and i still have a SGC 50...besides the RED SUN back, it is my favorite "back" card...i wish i had more

In reference to both this thread, and one I started last week about insurance,

What is the consensus of the E105 Population of Honus Wagner(batting) cards?
I have a very nice, raw one that someday might be slabbed. I am not a fan of slabbing to determine grade, but protection and authenticity might be nice just in case I ever "needed" another Wagner card instead of this one.

Some folks here mention the PSA pop report, but since these cards are condition sensitive...should we believe that the population is much larger in raw, low grade than in slabbed census polls?

Also, this is one of those cards that might need a special paragraph on the CIA insurance contract. My guess is that a nice example of Wagner would fetch in excess of 5K easily. Just a guess though.

Thanks for your input.

Brian L
familytoad

Greetings Brian,
If you havn't seen Goodwins Auction of the Wagner Card, Check out the Link! I think you'll like what you see

http://www.goodwinandco.com/auction/266/#a

Hey Anthony,
I do believe your right bout the "Back", It's a Beauty! I really Like the Smoothe lookin' Mello Green.

David,
Nice McGraw! The crease is part of history ay, One that I will definatly not care about, if I ever am able to put this set together at all.

Life's Grand,
Denny

I often wish I'd of held unto the McGraw...I ended up trading it, in a roundabout way (3 way trade) for 14 T206's PSA 1-3's.

Seems that there are a handfull of Wagner batting, but none of Wagner throwing. Wagner batting is not as prevalent as Young or Knight, but not as rare as most of the Mello Mints.

the set has never been put together .I was within 3-4 in 1998 of completing. Wagner batting ,Matty and Cobb was all that I remember needing.

I guess I should a let ya know that I was Lookin' for them,
"BUT KNOW YA KNOW !"

Denny

So it would seem that Bescher, Knight, Lajoie and Young are more plentiful than the other guys... The Catalog should reflect that, just a tiny bit.

I dug down to my lone E105... got him from Lew Lipset years ago. Loved it when his catalogs came out, and The Old Judge was wonderful, too. With Mr. Lipset the transactions were worry-free.

No E105s for me. In fact, I have never actually owned one before. However, I do have this little gem, which I believe is one of only two known:

I really like that, thanks for sharing.

Dan, the Wagner batting is no more available then the others its just that in the past six years I sold four of them and they have circulated amongst the small group a dozen times or so. There are for certain more Lajoies and Youngs out there from what Jay recalls as I remember that group too and caught a dozen of them then. I also purchased the Dan Koteles collection in 95 or so through John Billingsley. I recently sold a group of 16 different then a group of 11 then a hall of fame group of 8 in the past month. They are much rarer than even common E-107s and there has never been a public group offering from any major auction house. Most I sold were populations of 1.I sold 5 of them sadly on e-bay five years ago for a fraction of the present value. All in all, I had 34 different players and I think at one time Koteles had about the same.

Hey "Danny" that Knight looks familiar ( to both Scott B and myself! )

Richard,that wrapper is really cool!



BcD

Hey BcD, can you email me, please sir?

I think I read somewhere (probably here) that there are fewer a number of any given Mellow Mint player than there are of t206 Wagners -- true ???

i'd agree that's most likely true...as is true about a lot of pre-wwI issues. I'd venture most e94's, e97's are more scarce than t206 honus too.

pete in mn

I made it to about 25/50 until I sold off a lot of about 20 through Mastro a fews years ago. Most of the lot was resold on ebay about a year after the sale. Seems like most collectors are looking for this series as a type and do not pursue the set. I have owned or seen all of the cards in the series except for Joe Tinker and Bill Bergen. regards

BCD,

I do remember a significant lot of 20 or so being sold through Mastro's or Robert Edward's a few years ago.

I agree that they are extremely difficult with some of the cards being near impossible.

I posted it in the pickups thread...

but it belongs here as well.

the group in Mastros all had the split in the middle, my near set did not have a one with that. Regardless of issue or unless a Boston Garter correct size , I do not buy cards with splits.

I would like to know how these were put in the companies product. Obviously , and at least 2 ways ,no other way to explain the drastic indifferences.

the ones issued in the package of gum(wrapper shown above) were folded to fit into it. The other unfolded ones which are predominately high grade and usually found in groups of players, were never issued, perhaps excess printed cards that someone from the printers saved. Also the high grade groups seem to all originate on the eastern seaboard.

Scott

If anyone else has a horizontal mello mint - please let me know.

The "Mello Mint" ad on the back of the Matty is upside-down as far as I am concerned. If you look at the Matty and turn like you would the page of a book (right to left) - the Mello Mint back appears upside down.

If you flip it (bottom to top) it appears right side up.

Its all a matter of how you turn the card... but to me it is upside down.


I am wondering if that is how the issue decided the backups should be... or if the matty was printed 'wrong'. Would love to hear if anyone else has a horizontal.

Thanks.

Oh, Joe....

It would be right way for an attorney who is used to flipping papers in a legal file, where they're attached at the top and fold up.

And which way are the E145s?

Seriously, do all horizontal E105s have their fronts oriented inversely to their backs?

Frank.

great comparison. The horizontal mello mint (at least the Matty) is exactly like those upside down cracker jacks.

I wouldn't doubt it if green-suited, gum-chewing mello mint lawyers made that decision 100 years ago


so - are they all that way?

For what it's worth, the mastro lot of 20 that I sold were all sgc graded and 90% of the lot did not have the 'fold'. Most of the e105's that I see do not have a fold, contrary to published reports. The complete lot that I commissioned was not pictured and was not described properly and I took a bath, a big bath. Maybe there was another lot with the creases that I missed. Regards.

Joe D., I have an E105 Mello Mint in horizontal format (Bridwell). It is the one shown on the E105 page on the Old Cardboard website. Unlike your Mathewson, the back of the Bridwell card is "right side up" if you look at the front and turn like you would the page of a book. Hope this helps, Lyman