1911 M131 Baltimore News Newsboys Cy Young - Highest Graded!

Sold For:

$7,800

Year:

1911

Auction:

2016 Spring

Lot #:

650

Category:

Prewar Baseball - 1910s and 1920s Cards

Graded VG/EX+ 55 by SGC (submitted by REA). This is the ONLY example graded at this level with none higher! The 1911 M131 Baltimore News Newsboys Series set is an incredibly rare baseball-card issue. Presented is one of the key cards from the set: Hall of Famer Cy Young of the Cleveland Naps. This set is very similar in design to George Close Candy, but with each player image printed against a light blue background on the front, and with the reverse featuring advertising along the top, which reads, “The Baltimore News Newsboys Series – Prize of $1.00 to First 35 Boys Getting Full Set of the Following:" followed by the complete thirty-card checklist of the set. Jefferson Burdick gave this E94-related issue its own catalog number (M131) in the American Card Catalog because it is clearly a distinct issue from E94. Based on the reverse advertising, this set may have been a special promotion produced for and marketed exclusively to the Baltimore News newsboys. This type of severely limited distribution would certainly account for their extreme rarity. To date, SGC and PSA have combined to grade a total of just eighty-seven cards (of all subjects) from the entire set, including only three examples of Young. Amazingly, the offered Young is also the highest-graded example ever evaluated (of all subjects) by PSA and SGC! This example is crisp and clean with light, even wear to the corners, flawless colors, and no creases. The reverse ideally features bold and crisp printing and is entirely clean except for two small traces of fingerprints in the bottom third. This is a very rare opportunity to acquire a remarkable example of one of the key Hall of Famers from one of the rarest prewar issues in all of card collecting. From the Dan Gantt Collection. Reserve $1,000. Estimate (open).