Here’s a T206 Lenox Cigarettes Fred Payne card that was offered for sale back in 1993.
It was a part of Sotheby’s Important Baseball Cards and Sports Memorabilia auction catalog from March 1993. They described it as “one of the scarcest backs in exceptional near mint condition” and gave it an estimated final price of $500-600.
I’ve dabbled in T206 collecting in the past, but never very seriously. PSA says the extremely rare backs in the set belong to Drum, Lenox, and Uzit (the Ty Cobb back is the ultra rarity). Looking in their Pop Report, there are just five copies of Fred Payne’s Lenox-backed card: a PSA 5, a PSA 2, a PSA 1, and two graded PSA Authentic.
I did some research and came across four of them.
PWCC sold the PSA 5 for $5160 in October 2023. It’s the same example that Sotheby’s sold.
By the way, REA previously sold the PSA 5 for $3900 in the Spring of 2016. They also sold the PSA 1 copy in September 2021 for $2040.
Heritage has sold the nicer authentic copy twice: first, in June 2021, for $1500, and then, in May 2024, for just $630.
Heritage also sold the authentic altered copy for $666 in May 2023.
