1936 Goudey (R322) Set and Checklist

Posted on October 5, 2016 by Pre-War Cards

‘It’s In The Details’

Title	R322 Goudey
Year	1936
Size	2 3/8″ x 2 7/8″
Images	Black and White
Type	Candy/Gum
Number in Set	25

1936 Goudey (R322) Overview

After producing three years of sets with colored artwork, Goudey switched to real black and white images for its 1936 set. The cards also included an italicized name on the fronts with the backs including a short biography. A somewhat thick white border is around the edge of the cards.

The name on the cards is often mistaken for a replica signature. However, the names are simply written in a cursive autograph-like font. The name of Hall of Famer Kiki Cuyler, for example, looks nothing like his actual autograph.

Also for the first time, Goudey’s sets were not numbered on the backs. As such, most collectors have taken to arranging these simply alphabetically like many of the older cards that existed without card numbers.

The cards were a decided shift from Goudey’s earlier ones. Earlier Goudey cards issued from 1933 through 1935 included color art depictions of players. These cards not only used actual pictures, but they were printed in black and white. The sets were also larger (significantly so in the cases of the 1933 and 1934 sets) in previous years and this set, in general, is not a huge collector favorite.

The set was sort of a makeshift one in that it included features from other 1936 Goudey sets. The pictures were the same ones used in the company’s 1936 R314 Goudey Wide Pen premium photos. The only difference is that these cards used a cropped version of those photos. The backs also served as game pieces with action words printed on them. The words were used to allow collectors to simulate a baseball game and some, if not all, of the same actions were used in the 1937 R325 Knot Hole League set also produced by Goudey.

The checklist does include several Hall of Famers but is also missing some big names such as Joe DiMaggio, who made his debut in the league that year with the New York Yankees. Also not in the set were several other big names such as teammate Lou Gehrig, Dizzy Dean, Lefty Grove, Jimmie Foxx, and Mel Ott – all of whom were All-Stars that season and Hall of Famers. Still, it does include more stars than most collectors think.

With such a short checklist, it would have been difficult to squeeze everyone in. But several nominal players could have been removed in place for some bigger names. Still, the short checklist makes it a great target for collectors just starting out with pre-war cards. Still, the set does not exist in nearly the same quantities as Goudey’s earlier 1933, 1934, and 1935 sets.

1936 Goudey (R322) Master Set

It is important to note that many different backs are found with the different players. In all, there are 25 different back combinations. So while 25 player cards make up the set many more would comprise a theoretical master set.

If all 25 players had all 25 back combinations, that would give us a total of 625 cards in a master set. However, nowhere near that amount for each player has been discovered. To date, most players have seven known backs and a total of 176 have been found in the master set, per this survey.

The 25 back combinations are listed below the checklist of players, courtesy of Matthew Glidden of the Number 5 Type Collection blog.