Lets start with the song, "Somebody Loves Me", which was written, both the words and the music, by Hattie Starr, and sung by Josephine Sabel. However neither of these ladies names appear on this card, only the name of the publisher does, and that was Willis Woodward & Co., of 842-844 Broadway, New York.
Hattie Starr actually appears on two cigarette cards from Duke`s "Actors and Actresses" (N.145-7) and you can see both of them online at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This either means that she was also an actress, or that the set included theatrical and musical personalities from in front of, and behind the screen.
i have also found Josephine Sabel, on a Little Rhody Cut Plug card, at Ohio State University This was a brand used by Geo. F. Young & Bro., who also sold "Grand Victory" cigars. At one time they were based at 29, Westminster Street, Providence, Rhode Island. I don`t know much else about them yet, but will look them up tomorrow.
Anyway, to our card, and it looks like this is the first "Songs" card used, so it becomes the home page for the whole group.
These sets are first recorded by Jefferson Burdick, in an earlier edition of his American Card Catalogue than I own, as :
T410 - Illustrated Songs.
1 - Actresses, with frameline (50) TW46 and 47 [valued at 20 cents each]
2 - Actresses, no frameline (102) TW48, 49, 50 [valued at 15 cents each]
3 - Songs Illustrated (25) and Dancers (25) TW51, 52 [valued at 20 cents each]
4 - Songs Illustrated (50) TW53, 54 [valued at 20 cents each]
5 - Songs Illustrated (25) brown backs, TW55 [valued at 40 cents each]T457 - 25 Popular Songs and 25 Dancers (50) Duke backs, as T410-3 [valued at 20 cents each]
I know that they appear in that first, because in our original Tobacco War Booklet, RB.18, published in 1951, where they fill the whole of section III, that section is subtitled as "Songs & Dancers Series - Burdick Nos. T410 and T457". However my Burdick catalogue, from which I quote above, already uses the TW codes to cross reference to our Tobacco War book, published in 1951.
Our book starts with a briefish summary, but then sorts the sets out in a slightly different way to Mr. Burdick, though it is easy to sort them out because of those codes. This reads :
The nine Song series in this section can be recognised by the Song stanzas which occur on the backs of all the Song cards issued by A.T.C. The Dancers series under item 52 is included since it forms part of the Duke issue under Item 51.
The section has been sub divided as follows, one card each of the Song series being illustrated in Fig.IIIItem 46. Songs "A". With framelines. Captions in black, thin closely-spaced letters
Item 47. Songs "B". With framelines. Captions in brown, thicker letters wider spaced
Item 48. Songs "C". No framelines, with border. Captions in small type, all except one in quotation marks.
Item 49. Songs "D". No framelines, with border. Captions mostly in large type, all in quotation marks.
Item 50. Songs "E". No framelines, with border. Captions without quotation marks.
Item 51. Songs "F". No framelines or border. Size 70 x 36 m/m. Back in black
Item 52. Dancers
Item 53. Songs "G". No framelines or border. Size 66 x 38 mm. Back in green. Captions in very large letters
Item 54. Songs "H". No framelines or border. Size 67 x 38 mm. Back in green. Captions in small letters
Item 55. Songs "I". No framelines or border. Size 70 x 37 mm. Back in brown
All series were issued by A.T.C. Items 51 and 52 were also issued by Duke. Most of the cards bear copyright dates of songs on backs, and the series can thus be dated with fair accuracy. It appears that one series was issued during each of the years 1895-6-7-8 and 1900, with two series in each of the years 1899 and 1901
As this is a very lengthy section I will scan and attach the checklist of just our set now, and the others will appear on the pages of the other sets as and when they are featured. I will say that I have slightly amended this list as some of the words used on the original cards, and repeated in the book, are words which I, and many other people, object to. And so I have replaced them, with a line.
A few of the ladies featured on the cards have been identified, including ours, though it is slightly incorrectly quoted as Maxime Elliot, and not Maxine. She was born Jessie Dermot on February the 5th, 1868, in Rockland, Maine, and became an amazingly popular actress and businesswoman, even running a theatre, and becoming involved with the silent film industry. She was also rumoured to have had liaisons with many prominent people, including King Edward VII, though her one true love, the New Zealand World Number 1 tennis player Anthony Frederick Wilding, ended in tragedy, for he was killed in action during the First World War. This changed everything for her, and she not only moved to Belgium, but threw herself into raising funds and support for the Belgian War Relief. She never married, or maybe even loved, again. She did make a few silent films, notably "Fighting Odds" in 1917, but in 1920 she retired, and little is known of her later life, only that she died in March 1940, in Cannes, France, aged seventy-two.
Returning to the cards, the next appearance of the group is in our original World Tobacco Issues Index, as :
SONGS "A" (A). Back in black (25). See RB.18/46. Ref. USA/T410-1 ... A52-154 [A560-590]
A. Thick board, size 70 x 39
B. Thinner board, size 67 x 39SONGS "B" (A). Back in black (25). See RB.18/47. Ref. USA/T410-1 ... A52-155 [A560-595]
A. Size 70 x 39
B. Cut to 67 x 39SONGS "C" (A). Back in green (25). See RB.18/48. Ref. USA/T410-2 ... A52-156 [A560-600]
1. First 25 designs
2. Second 25 designsSONGS "D" (A). Back in green (25). See RB.18/49. Ref. USA/T410-2 ... A52-157 [A560-605]
SONGS "E" (A). Back in green (27). See RB.18/50. Ref. USA/T410-2 ... A52-158 [A560-610 - see below]
SONGS "F" (A). Back in black (25). See RB.18/51 and X.21/51. Ref. USA/T410-3 ... A52-159 [A560-615]
A. Size 70 x 39. Back with tiny scroll at base
B. Size 67 x 39. Back without tiny scroll.SONGS "G" (A). Back in green (25). See RB.18/53. Ref. USA/T410-4 ... A52-160 [A560-620]
SONGS "H" (A). Back in green (25). See RB.18/54. Ref. USA/T410-4 ... A52-161 [A560-625]
SONGS "I" (A). Back in brown (25). See RB.18/55 and X.21/55. Ref. USA/T410-5 ... A52-162 [A560-630]
There is not much difference in the updated version of this work, save new codes, which appear in brackets after the original ones - and the fact that since the original Tobacco War reference book was published in 1951 it too has been updated, and prefixed as reference book RB.118, though the code suffixes behind the diagonal lines remain the same as those showing above. However there is a change to one of the sections, which now reads :
SONGS "E" (A). Back in green (27). See RB.18/50. Ref. USA/T410-2 ... A560-610
A. Caption in brown
B. Caption in black