This is the vinyl variant box, not the textured paper you see on some variants of the '76 Deluxe. My copy is the vinyl variant and looks exactly like this.
I thought paper was only the first, how do we ever know the tissue paper is genuine, carbon dating?
There's some debate in the community about whether the vinyl box is a true '76 variant or if the textured paper box is the only originally issued box by GA&U. While we have only seen the textured paper box on the 1st print. We have seen many vinyl boxes with 1st prints as well as the re-prints starting in '79 onward.
Could be that GA&U made both kinds of boxes and issued 1st prints in '76 with both (my belief) or could be that a lot of dealers are assembling sets with later boxes and 1st print books, I think that's unlikely though based on observations over the years.
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