Judging the Authenticity of Early Baseball Cards

by David Rudd Cycleback

Chapter 4 : Another old time printing method:
Chalk and crayon lithography

(c) cycleback 2003, 2005 all rights reserved

Crayon and chalk lithograph trade card. Though not common, the collector will sometimes find 1800s baseball cards, usually trade cards, with chalk and crayon lithography. This type of printing was also used on some early advertising signs, vintage movie posters and fine art prints. In the fine arts, artists use handmade lithographic techniques to produce a variety of effects.Lithography can create original prints that mimic a pen and ink drawing, a watercolor painting, an etching and a chalk and crayon sketch.Often times, artists mix and match these and other techniques in a single print. Chalk and crayon lithographs are easily identifiable, because they look like chalk or crayon sketches.A chalk lithograph looks like a chalk sketch and a crayon lithograph looks like a crayon sketch.It's sometimes difficult to tell whether a chalk and crayon lithograph is a print or an actual sketch.Even when viewed up close and under a magnifying glass, the printing will have the subtle detail of an original sketch.There will be no halftone dot pattern. These lithographs were made by the artist using special lithographic chalk or crayons to draw directly onto the printing plate.This is why the prints so closely resemble original sketches. One of the great things about chalk and crayon lithography is that it is extremely difficult to counterfeit deceptively.The printing is simply too tonally subtle and detailed to counterfeit so as to fool someone familiar with the printing technique.The only way to reproduce a chalk or crayon lithograph so that it looks halfway decent, is to use the modern halftone printing methods.This means that virtually all reproductions of chalk and crayon cards or posters or signs will have the tell tale halftone dot pattern. If you have a known trade card or antique sign that resembles a chalk and crayon sketch, even under a loupe or magnifying class, it's most probably genuine. cycleback.com................cards main (c) david rudd cycleback, cyclback.com all rights reserved