This clue was a craftier one, because an anchor, which, believe it or not, is a style of beard. It is often said to be pointed, but as it traces the jawline it is only pointed on a man with an oval face, for most of us it is a squarer design. The crossbar of the anchor is formed by the moustache which accompanies it, and there is a small tufted goatee which makes it look like a bar runs up and joins the two.
The set was issued by W.D. & H.O. Wills in two forms.
a) is the Home Issue, only released in the United Kingdom, from May 1925, and the backs mention the Imperial Tobacco Company. . They are large cards, measuring 79 x 62 m/m.
b) was issued in New Zealand, about 1925, and they do not mention the Imperial Tobacco Company. These are sometimes called large size and sometimes medium, and there is some discrepancy about the actual size, for in Wills Reference Book RB.16 (part four) it is given as 77 x 59 m/m, but in both our World Tobacco Issues Indexes, the original and the modern, it is given as 71 x 58 m/m. So let us go check our cards and see if there are not three sets! By the way these cards have a different reference code, which is either W675-645, W62-447, or W/230B
Strangely the Wills set is not the only set of these cards, for it was also issued by The Imperial Tobacco Company of Canada. It is stated to be "similar", and that appears to refer to the back design and the issuer`s details. The most intriguing thing here is the size, because that is recorded as 71 x 59 m/m, and that is almost identical to that given in the Wills Reference Book RB.16 for their New Zealand Set. So was there some confusion at that time between the two sets, which was later cleared up, allowing for the correct dimensions to appear in the original World Tobacco Issues Index? If you know, please tell us.....