T206 Honus Wagner

The T206 Honus Wagner baseball card depicts the Pittsburgh Pirates’ Honus Wagner, known as “The Flying Dutchman”, a dead-ball era baseball player who is widely considered to be one of the best players of all time. The card was designed and issued by the American Tobacco Company (ATC) from 1909 to 1911 as part of its T206 series. Wagner refused to allow production of his baseball card to continue. While Wagner was a tobacco user himself, he may have objected to the card’s inclusion with tobacco products due to a personal objection to tobacco, though this objection is disputed. The ATC ended production of the Wagner card, and a total of only approximately 50 to 200 cards were ever distributed to the public; the exact number is unknown. In 1933, the card was first listed at a price value of $50 in Jefferson Burdick’s The American Card Catalog, making it the most expensive baseball card at the time.