Card of the Day - 2022-03-13

A possible triple answer here to our card clue, a nose, a red nose, and a comic or clown – all fitting in really well with Red Nose Day and Comic Relief.

This great card was actually issued in both standard and the large size, and both were listed for sale in the London Cigarette Card Company's 1950 catalogue at 1d. a card or 5/- a set. The fifty cards in the set are split into sub series by the shape and meaning of the nose, each has a prefix letter and a number from 1-10 on the front.

There was also a special instruction leaflet, which is mentioned on the reverse of each card along the side where it says “Leaflet – how to play the nose game can be obtained from your dealer”. And it is a leaflet, very thin paper, usually quite browned, just a single small sheet of paper folded in half with printing on both sides – all of these things have not led to these flimsy and very ephemeral items not having a great survival rate.

Now just like the writer of cardsboard I do not have a leaflet to hand to scan; but I have found one for you to look at on the Cartophilic Information Exchange

As to why this website is interested in this set, well, card C5, under the subset of “The Aggressive Nose” shows a footballer. I am not sufficiently skilled to recognise the footballer depicted, so I cannot say whether it was a sly dig at a particularly violent tackler. But one of our readers might be equipped to do so….