General Forum

I was perusing some Ebay vendors for Houston Colt 45s cards and found a couple with "Not Rubbed" as a descriptor. What's that mean? I haven't been able to find an explanation on the net.

I have some vintage football cards listed on ebay as "unrubbed". The backs of the cards had a trivia question (usually) and you rub the blank area with a coin and a cartoon with the answer would appear. Here's a 1961 Topps example.

Had to do some searching but I found a rubbed card.  And wouldn't you know, it's one of my stars.

Thanks! I was aware of that feature but never made the connection.

You reminded me of the hidden pictures/answers. You had to place a piece of red transparency over the card to see the hidden picture. I wish I still had a piece of that red transparency. Wonder if anyone saved any of those?  Does the red transparency count as an "insert"?  I don't see it listed with the set.

UPDATE: I checked ebay. A seller wants $10 for the Red Cellophane insert.

I changed the photo. I put the red and blue film over the camera lens.

Absolutely it should be in the set checklist. That is crazy cool !!! Reminds me of the Score cards back in the 90's .... I'd say 96ish.  If anyone ever finds one of the Score decoders from the mid 90's I would LOVE to have one. I have never seen one for sale or trade. Only ever seen the ones at my card shop back then. It told you if your card was a winner or non-winner for a golden blades card. They were supposed to be returned and/or destroyed I do believe after the promotion was done. I have seen sites showing how to decifer the cards visually but a decoder should would be nice. I am still looking for a Ranford winner non-redeemed.

I think that "unrubbed" notation is a bunch of junk. Over the years some of those "unrubbed" cards have indeed been "rubbed" but the technology for how they appear has long vanished. The idea was you rubbed the blank area (that had a special type of film on it) with the edge of a coin to reveal the image/message. I Know from experience that sometimes if you rubbed TOO HARD nothing showed up and you damaged the back, or there wasn't enough of the "magic" film and the image still wouldn't show up or only show up partly. If you tried to rerub a card that was already had been rubbed again nothing would happen or you would do more damage to the card. I've had many "unrubbed" cards over the years. I would occasionally try to rub them to see it they still worked but they don't anymore.

Apparently that seller is unaware of the existence of those cheap 3-d 'glasses'

 I sold a 1963 wrapper and one of the red cellophane things for a good price on Ebay last year.   I believe I have another around here somewhere.   If I find it,  I will bring up the subject again.      On the wrapper, I believe it specified that it came with the red transparency.

Yes. There's a scan of a wrapper under Packaging.  I updated the photo in my previous post. I put the red and blue film over my camera lens.

NJDevils wrote:

 I sold a 1963 wrapper and one of the red cellophane things for a good price on Ebay last year.   I believe I have another around here somewhere.   If I find it,  I will bring up the subject again.      On the wrapper, I believe it specified that it came with the red transparency.