T204 Ramly Cigarettes cards of 1909 feature a beautiful black-and-white portrait of each player encircled in an ornate border with the player's name, position, and team affiliation printed at the bottom. The cards, which are embossed and highlighted with gold ink, are extremely condition-sensitive because they are printed on flimsy paper. The gold borders are also very susceptible to chipping, as is the case with most gold-bordered cards. Between the outstanding player selection and the overall beauty of the issue, higher-grade examples from the set are extremely pricey, making affordable specimens tough to find.

SGC has only ever graded 17 total examples of this 1909 Ramly T204, with only five receiving a higher grade than the EX 5 offered here of Chicago pitcher Ed Ruelbach.

The centering is very nice on this one, save for some minor diamond cutting which leaves the top left corner just a hair higher than the right, keeping the card from grading even higher than it has. The white background is wonderfully clean, with the dark gold border providing a beautiful contrast. There is some light edge wear and chipping that is so common with the set's gold borders, particularly in the corners and along the right edge. The portrait area is beautiful, and Ruelbach's image is brilliantly bright and clean. The reverse is also wonderfully bright and clean, with almost no soiling to speak of except maybe faintly along the bottom edge. Soiling is not unusual for these cards, where the embossing can act like a dust magnet.

Attractive Ramlys are among the most beautiful cards in the hobby, but the eye appeal of the issue can sometimes suffer in the lower grades. This is an extraordinary example seldom seen with this sort of visual appeal at this - or any - grade.