THE ORIGINAL FORM OF HALF-TONE PRINTING: PHOTOENGRAVING
Many (though not all!) early baseball cards used an old fashioned form of printing called photoengraving (also known as 'halftone relief'). Some of the most popular and expensive cards in the hobby were made with this type of printing. Just a few of the sets made with this type of printing include 1927 Fro Joy Babe Ruth, 1923 Maple Crispette, the early Sporting News sets, early Exhibit Supply Co., Breisch-Williams, Conlon Cabinets, 1947 Bond Bread.
Photoengraving was commonly used on 1900-1920 cards to produce black and white photographically realistic images-- like the above image of Honus Wagner. In fact, you will notice that the sets I listed above all have photo-realistic images of the players on the fronts of the card. Photoengraving was not used for many colorful cards, like the T206s, T205s, Allen & Ginters and so on.
The photoengraved images on these cards are made up of a half-tone dot pattern, but one that, under the microscope, is easily distinguished from the half-tone pattern on the preceding page.
IDENTIFYING PHOTOENGRAVING WITH A MICROSCOPE
The most important detail under the microscope is the dark/hard rim surrounding all of the printed, as shown above. It almost makes it look as if it is in relief. I've nicknamed it 'waffle printing' because it often looks like a waffle to me. Without going into detail, this dark rim was cause by the uniquely shaped photoengraving plate that would literally push the extra ink to the edge during printing. If you look at the text and any border design on the front of the photoengraving cards, you will see that they too have a distinct dark rim under the microscope.
Also notice that many (not all) of the little dots have small crosses in them. As with the half-tone dots on the preceding page, the density of dots will change from area to area. In the light area of the picture there will be fewer dots, and in the dark more.
This type of 'waffle' printing is an old-fashioned technolgy, no longer used to make commercial prints like baseball cards. The presence of the above microscopic details on a 1915 Sporting News Babe Ruth or 1922 Exhibit Supply Co. card almost proves that the card is an original. As already noted, this type of printing was not used on all (or even most) old cards, so the lack of the above detail should not, by iteself, prove the esoteric card a fake.
Next: 19th century 'real photo' baseball cards, including the Four Base Hits and 1869 Cincinnati Red Stockings
