And so to another Saturday! Which is actually the eleventh of the year. Tine is definitely marching on. This week there are a great many centenaries to chat about, and the cards just flew into place – unlike some weeks when it gets to eleven pm and I am still phoning round looking for missing cards, or worse, still trying to find a subject. And that was very helpful because I spent four whole days waiting for my canine companion to come home from the vets when it closed that night. This should have given me about eight free hours every day, but it is impossible to do anything at such times apart from sit and stare at the phone and will it to ring - so long as it brings good news.
Not sure it is entirely good news, but he is sitting beside me, and we do not have to go back until Wednesday.
So let us discover the stories of two trophies, a thief, a spanner, a flight, a strike, and a collision - or three!
Let us start with.....
Carreras Ltd. [tobacco : UK] “History of Army Uniforms” (June 1937) 14/50 – C151-315 : C18-55
Why this card? Well, because today in 1872 two teams ran out on to the pitch at the Oval Kennington, and took part in the first ever Football Association Cup Final.
These teams were The Wanderers, who scored one goal, and the Royal Engineers A.F.C., who did not. And that explains our card. Especially as this uniform was sported by the R.E. in 1864, just eight years before our event, so it seems likely that many of the squad would have known it well and sported it bravely. And football would have been light duties for the men, who, as the card says : “have gone to the ends of the earth”.
It was only in July 1871 that a proposal was made to hold a competition, for a cup, between the members of the Football Association. The contest actually started in November of that same year, and it looks like the teams were Barnes, The Civil Service, Crystal Palace, Clapham Rovers, Donington Grammar School, Hampstead Heathens, Harrow Chequers, Hitchin, Maidenhead, Marlow, Queen’s Park (of Glasgow), Reigate Priory, Royal Engineers, The Wanderers, and Upton Park. Few of these now survive.
This set has a companion, and that is “History of Naval Uniforms”, which was issued quite quickly afterwards, in September 1937. The back is similar, but has a rope forming the title frame and an anchor below.
Our set is rather quickly described in our World Tobacco Issues Indexes as :
HISTORY OF ARMY UNIFORMS. Sm. Nd. (50)
And the “Naval” set`s listing follows the same pattern as this, just with that single word replaced
Peter, Cailler, Kohler, Nestle [trade : chocolate : O/S : Switzerland] “Machines Motrices Modernes” (Serie XVII No.11)
Especially apt today, for it is St. Patrick`s Day, we have a tale of another “Cup”, and a centenary, of the final of the 1924 Football Association of Ireland Cup, which had been first played in 1881.
The teams at this 1924 event were Athlone Town, who won 1-0, and Fordsons, and I have to say that it was the mention of Fordsons that sparked my interest, for they were the branch of the Ford Motor Company that specialised in agricultural vehicles, especially tractors. And here we have a Tracteur Fordson, rumbling down a rural European road.
Now the team started out as Fords Football Club in 1921, a works team, and in fact this was the first Ford factory outside of America. Then about a year later they changed their name to Fordsons F.C. to honour the tractors that Ford had been building at the plant since 1919.
The team first played in the League of Ireland in 1924 and continued, with a couple of breaks until 1930, at which time Ford seems to have broken any connection with them, for some reason, though the factory did not close, not relocate. However the team were not disheartened and they kept playing as Cork, right up until 1938.
This name does live on, with Cork City Football Club , but they were only founded in 1984.
Our card here is really not, instead it is one of those thin paper stamps that was issued in quantity by Nestle. However purists will say that it has more right to be here than any of the modern commercials, for it was given away with a product, not sold purely for collecting.
The title of the series translates to Modern Machines and Motors. Sadly I have no idea of what the other stamps are in the set though, so do drop us a line if you know.
The Premier Tobacco Manufacturers Ltd [tobacco : UK] “Eminent Stage & Screen Personalities” (1936) Un/48 – P822-100 : P83-1 : Ha.569
Our centenary today is of the release of “The Thief of Baghdad”, which starred Douglas Fairbanks, Senior, and Julanne Johnson. But also in the cast was Anna May Wong, playing a slave girl and spy.
This was not her first part, for she started four years earlier, in a film called "Dinty", about Chinatown. This was written and directed by film star Marshall Neilan, and produced by his own production company.
Between then and our film were nine appearances, mostly playing Oriental beauties, and one very odd film where she plays one of the many actors and actresses who is approached by someone (played by Mary Pickford), who is trying to raise funds for her little brother`s much needed operation.
Now if you would like to read more about Miss Wong, or, more correctly, Miss Wong Liu-Tsong, we have a blog about her elsewhere on our site.
Our card comes seven years after her first appearance on one. However there is a twist in the tale, for in our World Tobacco Issues Indexes this set is listed as :
EMINENT STAGE & SCREEN PERSONALITIES. Sm. 65 x 38. Brown. Unnd. (48) See Ha.569.
Now Ha. numbers refer to the early British Cigarette Issues Handbook part II, my copy of which is the first edition, and dates from September 1954. In fact mine is a limited edition, of 500 numbered and autographed copies, and its number 35. The autographs are the two compilers, Miss Dorothy Bagnall and Mr. Edward C. Wharton Tigar.
In that book the entry for this set reads :
Ha.569. EMINENT STAGE & SCREEN PERSONALITIES or MODERN MOVIE STARS AND CINEMA CELEBRITIES or SCREEN FAVOURITES & DANCERS (titled series). Unnumbered, 48 subjects. Three backs illustrated at Fig.569.
Louis Gerard – Titled “Screen Favourites & Dancers”. Front in brown. Back 3.
Anonymous (Teofani) – Titled “Modern Movie Stars and Cinema Celebrities”. Front in green. Back 2.
The Premier Tobacco Mfrs – Titled “Eminent Stage & Screen Personalities”. Front in brown. Back 1.
Then there is a list of the cards, in alphabetical order, which will be added as soon as I can make the scanner work.
By the way, this list, and the pictures, also appears in our updated Handbook, given the code of H.569. They have altered the order there though, starting with the Anonymous (Teofani) version, and then slotting in the Louis Gerard one, for which there is a small snippet of additional information, that being that their set can be found (A) with the front varnished – and (B) with the front unvarnished, which also has minor differences on the backs. But they close, like the World Index, with our Premier Tobacco set.
Anonymous [tobacco : UK] “Famous Bridges” (1935) 50/50 – ZA08-270 : ZA8-13 : RB.21/306.A
A bit of a break from centenary celebration, for today we salute the Sydney Harbour Bridge, which opened to the general public on this day in 1932. I say that because, curiously, school parties had been given early access, and had been allowed on the bridge for some time.
Before even checking the date of this card it is pretty obvious that it is contemporary with that opening. Not only is it the last card, but it is titled “The New Sydney Harbour Bridge”, and also they use it on the reverse of every card as the top bridge, carrying the title.
The idea of a bridge was first suggested in the 1890s, as the city expanded, and rumbled on until 1903. However it was revived in the 1920s, and for some reason they chose a British company to build it, Dorman Long and Co. They were not founded as bridge builders, they only produced steel, but in the 1920s, not too long before this project commenced, they bought out two bridge building forms, and thought it could be interesting to combine the making and the construction under one roof.
Now I have never climbed Sydney Harbour Bridge, and I have vertigo, but it is something that I have always had a hankering to do, and they do run tours that include doing just that. You can also have your birthday up there, or get married. So watch this space…. I have to add though that bungee-ing off the top will definitely not be on the agenda!
This set is down there at the back of the World Tobacco Issues Index again, but I did track it down. The write up is full of promise, and says :
FAMOUS BRIDGES. Sm. 66 x 37. Black and white photos. Nd. (50). See RB.21/306.A.
Now RB.21 is our extremely useful British American Tobacco Reference Book. And straight away the front index reveals our set was issued in the Channel Islands, in 1935. However the main text for this set tells of something I never would have guessed and that is that there is not just another issuer but that they issued this set in another size.
The full entry reads :
306. FAMOUS BRIDGES. Small cards. Fronts glossy photoprints in black and white, number at base. Back in black. Numbered series of 50.
A. Anonymous issue, with letterpress on back. Size 66 x 37 m/m. Titled “Famous Bridges” inscribed “This is one of a series of real photographs…”
B. Cia. Chilena issue. Size 60 x 40 m/m. Titled “Famosos Puentes del Mundo” with descriptive text in Spanish, “Fume Napoleon – Boquilla de Corcho o Ambre” at base. The numbering differs from A.
So is there a collector of Cia. Chilena cards who would like to tell us any more about this set? The date of issue would be fun, too. so we can tell whether it was reduced in size by us or enlarged by Cia. Chilena. And a scan of this card, front and back, in the Cia. Chilena printing, would be amazing.
Brooke Bond [trade : tea : UK] “History of Aviation” (1972) 12/50 – BRM-49
Back to Centenary City, for the next three events too! Today’s is a hundred years since an airline called Aero soared into the sky in the seaplane version of this very aeroplane, the Junkers F13.
The aeroplane only arrived in 1924 and it was chosen because of the terrain, because the seaplane could land on water, or unfrozen snow, and it also had a facility to fit skis, which would allow them to land in thick snow or ice. You may be wondering how it landed on a conventional airstrip, or on grass, and the answer is that it did not, for there were neither grass nor tarmac runways anywhere in Finland.
First of all they delivered mail, they took off from the harbour in Helsinki and flew to Tallin in Estonia. When this proved successful they wondered why they could not allow for paying passengers to come along as well. Those flights were from Helsinki to Stockholm and they shared the costs and risks by teaming up with a Swedish airline.
Now Aero was not a very catchy name for an airline, so they changed it, to Finnair.
And they used seaplanes right until 1936, when the first proper aerodrome was built.
This set only appears in our original British Trade Index part III, where it is described as
HISTORY OF AVIATION. Nd. (50). Issued 1972.
However we can add a few pertinent facts. Firstly there was a special album.
Godfrey Phillips [tobacco : London] “This Mechanized Age” - First Series, adhesive (1936) 49/50 – P521-488.1.a : P50-130.1.a : P/142 [RB.13/142]
Today in 1924 this would have been a rare sight indeed, because out of London’s 3,500 buses and 1,850 trams only 250 vehicles were on the road. The reason for this was a driver’s strike, organised by the traffic combine – to which the drivers of those 250 vehicles did not belong. Three days later, the drivers of underground trains announced that they would also be joining in.
So what was going on? Well, as often happens, privateers were trying to muscle in by running their own bus. This had all started in Autumn 1922, with one man and his bus, but by the beginning of 1924 there were over five hundred. And they were also resorting to increasingly dirty tricks, including short cuts, undercutting the regular fares, and even turning up just before the proper buses and saying they were an official replacement.
The tricks worked, and money was being lost by the main services, so much so that they announced they would have to cut the wages, starting with the trams, which strangely were not so affected as the buses, because anyone could drive a bus anywhere but the trams ran on dedicated rails, to which it was hard for an outsider to gain access. Anyway, in the marvellous way that workers stick together, all decided the only option was to strike.
By March 25th there was a solution, the London Traffic Bill. This regulated unofficial public hire vehicles, and also prevented certain cut through routes, which allowed other buses to beat their rival to the stop, from being used.
So, although the law did not come into effect until August, the strike was called off.
Our original Godfrey Phillips reference book, RB.13, published in 1949, describes this set, and its second series sibling, as :
THIS MECHANIZED AGE. Small card, size 67 x 37 m/m. Fronts printed by letterpress in colour, glazed. Backs in grey, with descriptive text. There are two series :-
142. First series of 50. Home and export issue 1936. (a) white card, no adhesive wording (b) cream card, inscribed “This surface is adhesive.”
143. Second series of 50. Home and export issue 1937. Inscribed “This surface is adhesive.”
Both series with the adhesive wording are found with this inscription but without the adhesive gum.
Now I have a feeling this may be because if my memory serves me right, cards with gum were not able to be exported, so it seems likely that a batch may have been printed before they notice that they had not removed the adhesive wording. What do you think?
Our World Tobacco Issues Index lists them as :
THIS MECHANISED AGE. Sm. Nd.
1. “First Series”. Back (a) with (b) without inscription “This Surface is Adhesive”. (50).
2. “Second Series”. Back inscribed “This Surface is Adhesive”. (50).
W.D. & H.O. Wills [tobacco : UK] “Famous British Liners” – 2nd Series (June 1934) 12/30 – W675-170.2 : W62-132.2 : W201
And lastly we have the tale of this rather unlucky vessel, the R.M.S. Olympic, who, today, in 1924, collided with the Fort St.George liner in New York harbour.
Now our ship was the sister of the RMS Titanic and RMS Britannic, yet she is less known of, which is surprising for she outlasted them both. The demise of the Titanic is well known. Whilst her sister, the Britannic, never sailed as a passenger liner, but she did see service in the First World War as a floating hospital, until she struck a mine in the Aegean Sea in 1916 and was sunk.
Olympic made her maiden voyage as a passenger liner in June 1911, from Southampton to New York. And in September that same year came her first collision, in the Solent.
Now some say it was an accident, and others blame the Hawke. What happened was our ship, a hefty girl, turned round and caught the other, its bow hitting our hull, twice, and ripping holes in the side, below the waterline, leading to flooding. There was no loss of life, and she sailed back home. But she did get the blame in official circles, because they believed that she had sucked the Hawke towards her simply by the amount of water that her turning had displaced.
During the First World War the Olympic also served, as a troopship, and saw action, when she rammed and sank the German U-boat (or submarine). This was a deliberate ramming, and once again her size had prevented the submarine from diving away in time. But it does give her the "honour" of being the only liner to sink a U-Boat.
Our collision happened during one of the transatlantic voyages which were so popular in the 1920s. If you were a star, or thought you were, these sort of trips were the places to see and be seen. Royalty, too, was much in evidence. Anyway, today in 1924, our vessel was reversing out of her berth in New York Harbour when suddenly a smaller boat, a steamship, was noticed below. This was the Fort St. George, which had rather a varied career, being built in Glasgow for an Australian company, then being used as a troop transporter and a hospital ship during the First World War, and then had been sold to the West Indies. In fact she would go on to serve in the Second World War as well, under Italian ownership, once more rigged out as a hospital ship. She was sunk in 1942. Anyway she was tough because although the collision with the Olympic caused extensive damage, it also almost scuppered both boats, and the entire frame of the reverse of our vessel had to be replaced.
Her final collision came with, of all things, a lightship. This was in May 1934 in appalling fog. For some reason, though they were in contact with each other, the ships came together, and the Olympic went straight through the middle of the lightship, slicing it into two pieces, and killing seven of its crew, four instantly, and the rest later, of their wounds.
Almost a year after this the Olympic was quietly withdrawn from service. Some say that she was too big a risk to continue. Others cite damage that was too extensive to repair safely. And of course, the 1930s was not a good time for huge transatlantic journeys, the rich showing off whilst the Great Depression hit home hard amongst normal people.
And in 1935 she was sold for scrap.
This set first appears in our original Wills reference booklet part IV, where it is catalogued as :
FAMOUS BRITISH LINERS. Large cards, size 79 x 62 m/m. Fronts printed by letterpress in colour. Backs in grey, with descriptive text. Home issue.
201. 30. 1st Series of 30. Issued 1934
202. 30. 2nd Series of 30. Issued 1935
The months of issue were supplied by W.D. & H.O. Wills, in their “Wills Works” magazines, and they are June 1934 and June 1935 respectively. Which seems rather poignant, bearing in mind that our ship had sailed her last voyage only in the April of that year
By the time this set gets to our World Tobacco Issues Indexes the set is simply described as :
FAMOUS BRITISH LINERS. Lg. Nd.
1. “1st Series of 30”
2. “2nd Series of 30”
Though the updated version manages to get both the bottom two lines of this to fit on one single line!
This week's Cards of the Day...
Time is shuttling by, and so did our theme of the week. I was not sure if we have any badminton players reading, but if so I hope that you enjoyed this week, when we had a little look at your sport, in honour of the Yonex All England Badminton Open Championship, which ran from the 12th until the 17th of March.
By the way The Yonex Co., Ltd was founded in 1946, and is based in Tokyo, Japan. Its connection with this event is that it produces sports equipment, including, but not only, for this sport. In fact it started out by making fishing equipment. And you can read a lot more at Wikipedia/Yonex
I must add that I am much chastened by the fact that the first All England Badminton Open Championship was held in 1899, one hundred and twenty-five years ago, and I know so little about it.
But this week I will try to redress that!
Saturday, 9th March 2024
Your first clue was this player’s surname, “cock”, which is one of the names for a shuttlecock, that curious mix of ball, feathers and cage that lofts back and forth across the net to score the points. Other names for it are a bird, or a birdie (referring to the feathers, which, I am very glad to say, are now more often synthetic or plastic) - or a shuttle (referring to its cage-like construction, and also, more recently, to the way it is shuttled back and forth across the net like the shuttle did in weaving cloth).
You may be amused to learn that at one time the "u" was an "i" but, for whatever reason, this version is no longer used.
Curious it may look, but the shape is very aerodynamic, and however it sets off on its flight towards its target it will almost immediately turn, by magic, and fly with the cork part, the rounded end, leading, and the feathers propelling it along from behind.
Bit of a hunt for this set but it is catalogued, at the back of the book, in our original British Trade Index part I as :
FOOTBALLERS (A). Sm. 80 x 38. Hand-coloured glossy photos. Back illustrated at Fig. ZA10-3. Unnd. (18). Issued with “Adventure”.
There then follows this list :
In our updated British Trade Index it has been restored amongst its Thompson stable-mates, and is catalogued as :
FOOTBALLERS (A). (AD). 1922. 80 x 38. Hand-coloured glossy photos. Unnd. (18). See HT-36. Back headed “With the Editor`s Compliments”. Anonymous.
Sunday, 10th March 2024
So our next clue was off the front of the card, net, here shown as netting, or what some readers may call chicken wire. However this picture does also have a striking resemblance to an actual net used in play, apart from the height, a badminton net being five feet and one inch high at the ends, dropping down to exactly five feet tall in the middle.
Now you may be wondering why there is a net at all, and whether, when training, one can be dispensed with? The answer is that there must be a net at all times, for it allows the court to be broken into two equal halves. Without it you would not develop the skills required to lob the shuttlecock across and outwit your opponent to win a point, with respect to the length of play and also to the height. If you practised without the net , and then tried to play, you would almost certainly soon find that most of your strikes were hitting the net and falling, point-lessly, on your side of it.
This set is described in our original Ogden`s reference book (RB.15, first issued in 1949), as :
50 POULTRY REARING & MANAGEMENT. Fronts lithographed in colour. Backs in green, with descriptive text. Home issues :-
136. 1st Series of 25. Numbered 1-25. Issued 1922.
137. 2nd Series of 25. Numbered 1-25. Issued 1923.
This is slightly shortened in our original World Tobacco Issues Index, to :
POULTRY REARING & MANAGEMENT. Sm. Nd.
1. “1st Series of 25”.
2. “2nd Series of 25”.
And the only change to this in the updated version of that book is that behind these “25”s it adds “(25).” It also squeezes them both on the same line below the title to make just a two line entry.
Monday, 11th March 2024
So lastly we have a “racket”, here being shown as a cacophony of noise, but also being the item of equipment which strikes the shuttlecock back and forth across the net.
You may think that you can just get away with using a tennis racket to play badminton with, but it is, dare I say, a whole different ball game. Badminton rackets are much lighter and more flexible and they also come in lots of different types, depending on your ability.
The "head-light" style is usually the starting point. This gets players used to holding a racket, and it is easy to control, also they can develop their style before opting to buy a racket in a style to which they may not be suited.
They then move on to a "standard", or "even balance" racket, which is lighter, and because of that you can manipulate it with more dexterity, curving your strokes aloft with a rather satisfying swoosh.
Lastly, when mastery is attained, they may like to try what is known as a "head-heavy" style. This is what the professionals all seem to prefer, mainly because the extra weight gives greater power and therefore sends the shuttlecock all the further. However they can be unwieldy for younger or smaller players, leading to sore arms, and also to more mis-strikes, because the racket cannot be held as steadily.
Now of course this card is much more often seen issued by Ogden`s, and you ought to have been able to have told that from just the front alone, because in the top right hand corner of the picture it says “BOY SCOUTS” where it usually says “OGDEN`S CIGARETTES”.
Now that the reverse has been revealed you can see that there is another difference as well, for instead of the block at the bottom containing the Ogden`s wording, there is a line drawing of the Boy Scout emblem.
So here is that Ogden`s version so you can compare it all the more easily. And, by the way, as this worked much better than I thought, there will be a lot more comparison cards like this added to future, and past, newsletters...
Before I gallop onwards, this is not part of the long five-set combination issue of “Boy Scouts” that was issued by Ogden`s between 1911 and 1914, whch was also issued by Churchmans. This set was issued later, in 1929, and is a stand-alone set of fifty cards. And because we have a reference book to the Ogden issues (RB.15, first issued in 1949), we can also add a description of what is ostensibly the same as our featured card, which is :
46. 50. BOY SCOUTS (1929). Fronts printed by letterpress in colour. Backs in green, with descriptive text. Home issue, 1929. Similar series issued by B.A.T.
That is our set, and it is catalogued in original reference book to the issues of the British American Tobacco Company (RB.21, issued in 1952) as :
215-46. Boy Scouts (1929). This series was issued as follows :-
A. Ogden`s Home issue.
B. Anonymous issue, with letterpress on back.
The index at the front of RB.21 also tells us that it was issued in the “Channel Islands and Malaya”, but gives the date as 1930, not 1929.
In our World Tobacco Issues Indexes it appears at the back of the book amongst the “Z” numbers, catalogued as :
BOY SCOUTS. Sm. Nd. (50). See RB.21/215-46.B
This card explained something else to me, who was never a boy scout, though I was, very briefly, a brownie – and that is the fact that the old chestnut of “Dib,Dib,Dib - Dob,Dob,Dob” is not strictly correct. The first acronym is really “Dyb”, which stands for “Do Your Best” - whilst Dob, the reply, is for “[We Will] Do Our Best”.
Tuesday, 12th March 2024
We chose this for our first card because it says, as a rough translation, that badminton originated in Tibet, or Thibet. The key is the words "le jeu d`estocade et le volant" and in French `Jeu de volant" means badminton. The "estocade" is not used today, but it refers to the thrust, or the forward motion, especially as an initial movement. It then goes on to say (translated into English) "which has become a Worldwide game, originated in Thibet, where it has been practised since two centuries".
That being a "maths" related term I am not too sure about whether this means since the second century, or for the last two centuries. I had a look online and found that it is pretty universally believed that the game dates back for at least two thousand years. However it seems to be as popularly believed that it started in China, where it was known as Ti Zian Ji - and where the shuttlecock was kicked, with the feet. More about this later!
Now most of what I originally wrote about this card has been superseded, and re-written before this text was ever shown. This includes the addition of a title and the number (possibly) that are in the set. The magical key to this was supplied by one of our readers, Mr. Sterling who told me this set was also issued in Great Britain, by Thomas Holloway of London, with pills and ointment. That Holloway set is listed in our updated British Trade Index as :
HOLLOWAY`S SPORTS & PASTIMES OF MANY NATIONS. 128 x 76. Nd. (50). Designs as those issued by Arbuckle Coffee in U.S.A. Backs a) 78 New Oxford St., b) 78 New Oxfort St., c) 113 Southwark St. A Spanish edition is also known. ....... HOL-170
Now it does not seem very likely that these are in the order of issue, for "Oxfort" is obviously a typographical error and would have been replaced by "Oxford" - it would have been odd indeed if it had happened the other way round.
Now I have found this card in both the Holloway and Arbuckle Coffee sets, online. In both this card is number 39. Both backs are very similar, and both close the reverse by calling the set "A Pictorial History of the Sports and Pastimes of All Nations".
These also give us an English text, which is : "Battledore and Shuttlecock, now universally played the World over, and popular for more than two centuries is of Thibetan origin. To this day this nation contains the most skilful players. These often attain such efficiency, that they strike the shuttlecock with the soles of their feet". At least it does on the Holloway set, the Arbuckle version starts by calling it "Battledoor". And if you look into the word Battledore it is the technical name for the racket.
Now our card may be the same on the front as the two above, but the reverse is entirely different, plainer, and also unnumbered. The curious thing is that it is not mentioned in the Trade Index, so it seems likely that it was not connected at the time of printing. Maybe this is the first time it has ever been so?
It was issued by a company that seems to have either been a cafe supplier or a cafe, for they cite chicory coffee, and bread or bakery products. Now some places quote the name of the firm as A. Cardon & Duverger, but this is incorrect, if you look closely at the cards the "&" is actually a hyphen of a double barrelled name.
They were based in Sainte Olle les Cambrai, now known as Raillencourt-Sainte-Olle, and it would have been severely altered in The First World War, for it is close to Arras and Cambrai. In fact the local area contains five War Cemeteries, and the graves of almost five hundred Canadian and British soldiers.
Wednesday, 13th March 2024
This is such a lovely card, though the shuttlecock looks rather an alarmingly large size, and is also facing straight down, which, earlier in the week, is something we learned it did not do.
Now this card, despite the set claiming to tell of the Origin of Games, seems to rather carelessly omit any reference to Tibet or China, and starts straight in with “Badminton, first played in England in 1873, has a curious history.” It then goes on to talk about a guest at Badminton House designing the game and calling it after the Duke of Beaufort`s residence in Gloucestershire. However I will take this in the light that the actual name “Badminton” was indeed invented in honour of this country estate – even though the text continues that “The game became widely popular in India”, which still has a kind of air of `after we invented it`.
In our original World Tobacco Issues Index the listing of this set reads :
ORIGIN OF GAMES. Nd. (15)
A. Small. 68 x 35
B. Large. 77 x 63
The updated version shortens it still further, to :
ORIGIN OF GAMES. Nd. (15)
A. Sm. 68 x 35 B. Lg. 77 x 63
I am unsure why there was only fifteen cards in this set. Does anyone know?
By the way, there is a checklist, and lots of other information, over at PreWarCards/SaronyOG
Thursday, 14th March 2024
I was rather surprised at the fact that I could find badminton players on cards, and here we have one of the finest of the 1930s, R.C.F. Nichols.
Our text tells us that “R.C.F. has proved himself a master at Badminton, he has won the All-England Men`s singles title three years in succession and five times in all, and with his brother Leslie retained the men`s doubles for the third successive year in 1938.” And our man also appears on Ogden`s "Champions of 1936", card 7
This set appears in our original reference book to R. & J. Hill (RB.2, published in 1942), with its companion, which we used elsewhere and will link to asap. This reads :
1939 50. CELEBRITIES OF SPORT (titled series) Size 2 9/16” x 1 ½”. Numbered 1-50. Fronts, printed three colour letterpress, from half-tone blocks; white margins.
Backs printed in black only, with descriptions and “Issued by R. & J. Hill Ltd….” at base.50. CELEBRITIES OF SPORT (titled series) Similar to the above in all respects but inscribed on backs, at base, “Issued with Gold Flake Honeydew Cigarettes”
(See Henry Archer & Co.) Both sets printed by W. Oliver, London.
In our World Tobacco Issues Indexes the set is truncated to :
CELEBRITIES OF SPORT. Sm. 65 x 36. Nd. 50.
A. Back “Issued by R. & J. Hill…”
B. Brand issue. Back “Issued with Gold Flake Honeydew Cigarettes”
The other 1920s and 30s players we found were :
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J.F. [Frank] Devlin of Canada - Churchman "Sporting Celebrities" 1931 - card 6
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D.C. [Donald] Hume - Churchman "Sporting Celebrities" 1931 - card 7
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Miss Thelma Kingsbury - Ogden "Champions of 1936" - card 6
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A. Ogier - Gallaher "Island Sporting Celebrities" 1938 - card 25
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J.E. [Jack] Purcell - Churchman "Sporting Celebrities" 1931 - card 8
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Miss L.C. Radeglia (though the card says C.L. on reverse) - Gallaher "British Champions of 1923" - card 50
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Sir G.A. Thomas - Gallaher "British Champions of 1923" - card 11
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Mrs. Uber - R & J Hill "Celebrities of Sport" 1939 - card 45
Friday, 15th March 2024
This card brings the Badminton tale on another thirty years. This shows the flag of Malaya, but again tries to claim the credit, but saying that "The greater part of the Malay Peninsula is under British Protection, so it is only natural that some of our sports are played in that country."
Now they cite three players on this card, Lim Say Hup, Teh Kew San, and Wong Peng Soon, but sadly I do not know which is shown. Maybe you do?
Lim Say Hup was born in 1935 in Penang and died in 2005 in Manila, aged seventy. He took part in his first All England Badminton Championship in 1959, winning the Men`s Doubles.
Teh Kew San was that doubles partner. He was also born in Penang in 1935 but he is still with us, and reportedly still plays.
Wong Peng Soon was the oldest of the trio and a four-time winner of the All-England singles title. He was born in February 1917 and died in Singapore in 1996. He is regarded as one of the best players ever.