Early American Baseball Cards
One of the earliest amazing collectible historical card sets ever produced in the United States of America is produced by Goodwin Tobacco’s 1887-1890 photographic series. Not only were they photos of legendary baseball players, their collection of 6,000 different photos also included boxers, theater stage entertainers, and world celebrities. These cards were quality made at the time with sepia-tone photographs glued onto cardboard. These sets includes priceless photos of legendary Hall of Fame personalities such as like Anson ($900) and Ward ($350), and special Brown’s Champions of 1886 like Latham ($175).
In 1887-1888 to compete with Goodwin Tobacco’s successful photographic cards, it’s competitor Allen and Ginter Tabacco released a two part card series called “World Champions” which had colorful illustrations that made it stand out from its sepia tone predecessor, making this set the most popular baseball card set of the 19th century in America.
With their success, Allen and Ginter next marketed their new larger package of Richmond Straight Cut cigarettes in 1888 with large size “jumbo” versions of their World’s Champions Second Series (N29) which now included colorful backgrounds to the illustrated baseball player portraits. These versions of baseball cards are rare today and sought after by collectors. A total of six baseball cards were made from this 1888 series, with New York catcher William “Buck” Ewing’s card valued the most at $1250 while others are worth about $1000 each.
Other companies entered the competition. In 1887, Buchner Tobacco released their own series of colorful cards, featuring Hall of Fame pitcher Hoss Radbourn. Kimball cigarettes distributed their Champions of Games and Sports series in 1888, featuring Dell Darling of Chicago. With a number of competition growing against Goodwin, the company recognized the threat to their market and released their 50 color set of “Champions” to compete with Allen & Ginter and Kimball’s color series