A Little Off the Top(ps)
December 22nd, 2011 | Published in Football Card Trivia
If you collect 1959 Topps football cards, you probably have seen cards with a dark mark on the bottom. You probably also have figured out that the dark mark is from the card below on the uncut sheet. Topps got a little artsy in 1959 and let the images of the players extend into the top border. Consequently, the cards don’t have to be too far off-center to have gotten a bit of the card below.
Shown here is an example, a Bart Starr card that is shifted far enough upward that it shows a bit of another player’s scalp. The other player in this case happens to be Ernie Stautner. In turn, the football in Starr’s hand extended into the top border, and most of the ball ended up on the bottom of someone else’s card.
So what, you ask? Well, I am piecing together a virtual uncut sheet of first series 1959 Topps cards, and clues from off-center cards are helping me piece the sheet together. You can see the modest beginnings of a first series sheet on my Virtual Uncut Sheets in Progress page. You can help: if you find another 1959 Topps first series card that shows a bit of a neighboring card, send me a picture of it.
What about the second series 1959 Topps sheet? Well, that one was easy, because I found a picture of a real one. You can see the virtual version in the Vintage Football Card Gallery.
