1928 Harrington, Sweetman, Tharp, Yuengling Sets (F50)

Posted on October 1, 2016 by Pre-War Cards

‘It’s In The Details’

Title	F50 Harrington, Sweetman, Tharp, Yuengling
Year	1928
Size	1 3/8″ x 2 1/2″
Images	Black and White
Type	Food
Number in Set	60

1928 Harrington, Sweetman, Tharp, Yuengling (F50) Overview

While four distinct sets make up the F50 designation in the American Card Catalog, each release is very similar to the others.

Harrington’s, Sweetman’s, Tharp’s, and Yuengling’s all produced baseball card sets in 1928. All products are considered food issues, although Sweetman could be considered a candy issue.

While Harrington, Tharp, and Yuengling cards were packaged with ice cream, it was never been truly confirmed what the Sweetman cards were packaged with. I did learn in 2016, though, that Sweetman apparently was in the business of making wax candy. But they also could have produced other products and since the cards and checklist are similar to the others, one could assume that ice cream may have been one of those as well.

Yuengling, of course, is known for its beer. However, they created a line of ice cream products during Prohibition when producing beer was no longer legal. As I outlined here, Yuengling, essentially, used these cards to help them stay in business.

Cards are black and white, measuring around 1 3/8″ x 2 1/2″. Sizes can vary slightly and it also isn’t uncommon to see these cards with a diamond cut.

The cards are okay, but not overly attractive. Many of the images are somewhat grainy in appearance. The set is entirely done in black and white with a player’s name and number at the bottom.

Each set contained 60 cards and the checklists were all nearly identical. Legends such as Ty Cobb and Babe Ruth were included in the sets, among others.

Finally, at least one photograph misidentification exists. Cards for Hall of Famer Bill Terry actually picture lesser known Zeb Terry. That is somewhat interesting as Zeb’s major league career was over in 1922 — several years before the release of these sets.

Back Variations

In all, a total of five backs are known. Each company has a different back mentioning their name and Yuengling has two variations. Pictures of backs for the four companies are pictured below.

At least one true back variation exists as Yuengling actually had a second type. While one type of Yuengling backs mentions a scooter as a potential redemption item, others do not. The variation that does not is pictured above.

Promotions

Each of the four backs described a particular contest for each manufacturer.

Yuengling, for example, offered a gallon of ice cream for a full set of 60 cards. Yeah, so in hindsight that was an awful deal. The Ruth card could be traded for a quart of ice cream or, per some cards, a $5.00 scooter. Again, crummy trade.

Tharp’s offered the same bad trade for a set but offered an ice cream bar for Ruth cards. Finally, Sweetman’s offered an album for fifteen cents of stamps for collectors to keep their cards.

Ironically, since they didn’t offer something in exchange for the cards (and instead encouraged collectors to keep them), you might expect to find many Sweetman cards still out there. But that is hardly the case and of the four brands, the Sweetman cards may be the most difficult to find.

Fonts

The quality of the cards was pretty low and you can find some font differences even in between the various issues. Type set can be slightly off on the back advertisements.

The Yuengling cards, for example, exhibit this. Immediately after mentioning that an ice cream novelty will be given for the Ruth card, the word ‘ALSO’ is printed on the next line and centered. That type lines up with the top but varies a little against the bottom text. The ‘O’ in ALSO in one type extends to the ‘g’ in Yuengling’s on the next line. In a second version, the ‘O’ extends slightly past it, to the ‘s’ in Yuengling’s.

Very slight variances shouldn’t be a cause for alarm when determining if an F50 card is authentic. Other such variances in things like strip cards exhibit that type of printing as well.

Rarity

Rarity for the four backs varies.

By far, the rarest back are the cards for Sweetman. These are rarely seen and, as you would expect, significantly more money. Harrington and Tharp cards are the next rarest with Tharp appearing to be rarer. Yuengling is by far the most common.

1928 Harrington, Sweetman, Tharp, Yuengling (F50) Set Checklists

As stated earlier, the checklist for all four sets is nearly identical. The lone difference for Card No. 59 is highlighted below. Other minor variations exist but the other card numbers are all the same to my knowledge.