For avid collectors of T206 baseball cards, the advertising on the back is part of the fun. The numerous brands of tobacco advertised on the backs of the cards offer a snapshot of what was then a booming industry. Smoking was everywhere and smokers were very loyal to their brand! Collectors know Sweet Caporal and Piedmont to be among the most common cigarette brands in which T206 cards were found, but the challenge is to find cards that were issued in brands of regionally issued or less popular kinds. This week, we’re offering a PSA 3 graded Oscar Stanage card featuring a Carolina Brights back. Carolina Brights were a brand of cigarette made by the Wells-Whitehead Tobacco Company in Wilson, North Carolina. A year before the 1909-1911 T206 cards began to show up, American Tobacco Company bought Wells-Whitehead but ATC kept the Carolina name on the box so they wouldn’t lose customers who were loyal to it. How rare are T206 cards with Carolina Brights backs? Consider this Oscar Stanage card, which is graded PSA 3. There has never been another card of its kind with this back graded any higher. The only brands PSA has graded with lesser frequency are Drum, Lenox and Uzit. They just aren’t found that often and usually only a few at a time are available in any market. Even if you don’t want to chase quantities of the rare T206 backs, it’s a lot of fun and very rewarding to try and accumulate as many different kinds as you can. They’re great conversation pieces, not to mention the rare backs being pretty good investments over time. There has been tremendous interest in this card and we expect a strong price. If you have rare T206 backs to sell, the market has never been better and we’re proving again that our auctions attract collectors who are looking for them.
