Saturday, again, they come round so fast. Or is that only for me ? And there was little to occupy me, no election this week, nor any motor racing, which means I will be able to catch up on last week`s at last, so long as I have done so by Sunday, when it disappears forever from the Channel 4 player.
Now this week I have an update for you on something in last week`s newsletter - sent in by reader, and contributor too, Stuart Arnold, who spotted our mention of the Abdulla Autobilder set - for Thursday the 11th of July - and wrote in to say that the cards which were changed were actually illustrated, both sides, on his website. He thinks that what happened was that a newer model came along and so the card was changed to show that instead. And he also corrects my error with the title, it ought to read "Autobilder (Automobile der bekanntesten Marken des Jn- und Auslandes) - aus der Reihe" whereas I had written "In". Curiously he also tells me that the letters "I" and "J" were often used interchangeably. I also found out that in Germany, these letters are also pronounced as an "I", however when the next letter is a vowel they use the "J" in the spelling instead of an "I".
One other thing that has happened this week is that I have had a bit of a spurt on our Card of the Day indexing, because I realised there is only six months left to index, the first Card of the Day entered into this current website being Stephen Mitchell & Sons` “Scottish Footballers” (1934), on the 31st of July, 2021, and the last card I added to the index being The Cameric Cigarette Card Club`s version of "Views of London" which was the Card of the Day for the 2nd of December, 2021. At the same time as adding them to the index I am also replacing any duplicated cards, so the last one of those was Godfrey Phillips` "Footballers" - Pinnace" brand - large cards (1922), which was the Card of the Day for the 15th of January, 2022, because it was a duplication of John Player`s "Footballers 1928" (October 1928), that having appeared on the 11th of December, 2021.
Now in the time betwixt starting the index and now I have seen my library swell somewhat, and so there are several codes, and much information, missing from the earliest of these cards. Therefore, once all the Cards of the Day are ensconced inside the index I intend to work through it and update them - adding them to the rotating banner on the home page as they are completed. I will do an issuer at a time, for it seems the simplest way to do it. After that I will start working on indexing the newsletters, or at least considering how this will be done. I do have thoughts, already.
Anyway, enough about the index! This week seems to have a rather strong smell of aviation fuel, but also fits in a journey into space, an unknown and maybe alien tribe, a return to childhood, and a trip to the ballet with a box of pastels.
Rittenhouse [trade/commercial : cards : O/S - USA] "Star Trek Picard Season 1 Promo Card" (2020) 1/
This is not the first time that this newsletter has boldly gone where no one has gone before, and I doubt it will be the last. However this time we are moving ahead in the narrative to Captain Jean-Luc Picard, who started his journey into the Star Trek universe in Star Trek: The Next Generation, in 1987.
Sir Patrick Stewart OBE, whose birthday is today, has actually been an actor for seven decades, on stage and screen, stepping on to the stage as a Royal Shakespearean Company actor in 1966, when he was twenty-six - though he had acted long before that. And in 1967, he made his debut on the small screen, as a fireman, in Coronation Street. He refuses to be typecast, and takes any part which pleases him, even voices for cartoons.
His first appearance on cards was in 1984, as part of the feature film "Dune", directed by David Lynch, where he played Gurney Halleck, described on Fleer`s "Dune", card 12 as a "warrior, writer of poetry and singer of songs." You can see this at the Trading Card Database / Patrick Stewart - along with the currently 501 others that he appears on !
However it is for his Star Trek performances that he is best known, perhaps because he has played that part most of all, starting in 1987 and being in one hundred and seventy eight episodes - plus all the feature films, the last of which was in 2002.
In the year 2000 he joined the X-Men franchise, as Professor Charles Xavier - or Professor X - and it has just been announced (July 2024) that he will be in yet another spin off "Deadpool and Wolverine".
Our card is from the spin off of Star Trek, called "Picard", after his character. It dates from 2021 and it is a "promo" card, in other words a special card issued to promote the forthcoming set of cards proper, namely : "Star Trek Picard Season 1 (One)". If you look at the card you can see it is P1, and P always stands for Promotion, so that is something else to look out for on modern cards, if you find a bundle at a car boot sale.
Chocolaterie de L`Union [trade : chocolate : O/S - France - Lyon] "Nations et Pavillions" / "Countries and their Buildings" (?) album two (1950s) 219/???
So here is our first Centenary Card, and also our first whiff of aviation fuel, for today, in 1924, those gallant aviators who were attempting to fly around the world reached Paris, and circled this building, the Arc De Triomphe.
You may remember, or you may be a new reader, that four aeroplanes had embarked, on March 17th, 1924, from California, trying to catch up and overtake a British team who were going the other way, but had left thirteen days before. The American team did suffer a few difficulties along the way, including the loss of one of the aircraft in April, in Alaska, though, luckily, the entire crew had managed to make it to safety. The three remaining aeroplanes were able to fly across Russia, Japan (where they heard news that the British team had crashed and were awaiting a new aeroplane to be delivered before they could continue), Korea, China, Vietnam, Burma, India, the Middle East, and Europe. They arrived in Paris, today, Bastille Day, and circled this structure, The Arc de Triomphe, as celebration, and perhaps to remember France`s Unknown Soldier, who had been interred there on November the 11th, 1920.
Actually we are calling this structure by a shorter name than it has, for it ought to be The Ard de Triomphe de l`Etoile - the "etiole" or star, being the twelve avenues which blossom out from its circle towards every direction. It appears that it lost its full name when the circle was renamed, to Place Charles de Gaulle. However it remains a war memorial.
This card was issued by Chocolaterie de L`Union, which was founded in Lyon in 1871 at Rue Victor Hugo - and along the way they bought up or merged with other chocolate makers, Ozereau and Janoray. In 1895 they moved, to Rue Vierge Blanche, or White Maiden Street, and quickly after to along the Grande Rue de la Guillotiere, which was a former military site, including a barracks. Once there, they changed the company name to "L. Janorayhéritiers, chocolat et cacao de l'Union", which seems to be preserving the name of the Janoray with whom they merged. Maybe he also got a seat on the board though, because in the late 1920s a Monsieur Janoray is cited as applying to convert part of 18 rue Victorien-Sardou to housing.
As far as their cards, this is just one of their sets, which were issued from the mid 1930s onwards. This is one of the later ones, issued between 1951 and 1956, and known as "Les Belles Images de Veronique et Jean Paul", two art drawn children who appear on the album cover to the late 1950s. "Belles Images" simply means beautiful pictures.
Our card states it is from album two, but I am unsure how the numbering worked, or how many cards there were, though I believe there were twelve cards to each of the sub-sets, and they fitted on a single page of the album. Rather incongruously, you may think, if you turn the album to the outside back cover, you will find the American Eagle - we know that the eagle was the company logo, but not why it was so Americanised as to have the "E. Pluribus Unum" beneath it, and be carrying the stars and stripes on its shield. Maybe you do?
Garbaty Cigarettenfabrik [tobacco : O/S - Germany - Berlin] "Die Eroberung Der Luft" / "Conquest of the Air" (1932) 38/216 - G090-250.2 : G14-10.2
Today, in 1916, saw the birth of a familiar name to anyone who has ever flown away on holiday - and that is Boeing.
Now Boeing was not a brand as such, it was a person, William E. Boeing, and he was happy enough being a lumber entrepreneur, making a not inconsiderable amount of money, when he took a trip to the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific exhibition in Seattle in 1909.
This was held from June 1st to October 16th 1909, and it was to attract settlers and businesses to come along and find out more about the Pacific Northwest. We know that much of the construction of the pavilions and interiors was done in wood, and that there was a forestry exhibit, but we do not know whether this was why our man has attended, or even if he had supplied any of the materials or assisted in an other way. What we do know was that he was struck, in a love at first sight kind of way, by the possibilities of powered flight, presumably, as I have found no examples of aircraft there, by a dirigible air ship, named "A.Y.P.E." after the exhibition, which flew about the grounds giving displays.
Then, in 1910 he bought a boatyard, maybe ostensibly as another string to his lumber business, but it was sited at the mouth of a river, and it was large enough to build an aeroplane in. And so he did, but not straight away, for he had flying lessons first, with Glenn Martin, who was an aircraft designer and builder, during which he purchased one of the craft, the so called "Flying Birdcage". This was actually a seaplane, which would float out of the boatyard, and take off from the river.
Sadly, shortly after it arrived, it crashed, and was damaged. Mr. Boeing contacted Mr. Martin for the necessary parts, only to find there would be a long delay - on which he decided not to bother, but to build his own, which he did, another seaplane. You can see it for yourself as card number one of a set of cards issued to mark the seventy-fifth anniversary of Boeing in 1991. He liked building that aircraft, a lot, and so he built some more, becoming Pacific Aero Products in the process, and changing that name to Boeing Airplane Co. in April 1917.
This card shows a slightly later aeroplane, the Boeing P-12 C, which first flew on the 25th of June 1928. It was very popular, and used by the Army Air Corps, the Marines and the Navy, and was the number one aircraft for these services during the 1930s, as well as being sold overseas. By the end of the decade it had been replaced for front line duties by newer models, but its ease of handling meant it was maintained as a training craft right into the Second World War.
And if you want to read the entire story of the Boeing enterprise, nip along to Wikipedia/Boeing
This card comes from a huge set, split into many sections. It is described in our World Tobacco Issues Indexes as :
"DIE EROBERUNG DER LUFT" (The Conquest of the Air"). Sm. 61 x 41. ... G14-10
1. Back headed "Garbaty-Bildersammlung". (234). Nd. in sub-series
Abt. I ........................................................................... 24
Abt.II - Serie A (30). B (12). C (6). D (6). E (6) ....... 60
Abt.III - Serie A (6). B (36). C (18). D (6). E (6) ...... 72
Abt.IV - Serie A (6). B (12). C (6). D (12)........ ....... 36
Abt.V - Serie A (12). B (12). C (12). D (6)............... 422. Inscribed "Folge : Ausland" (216) Nd. 1/216
These two groups are quite different though, because the first is entirely of German aircraft, starting with those twenty four cards of "the historical development of flight", and moving through
- II : "Commercial Flight" -
- III : "Sports Aircraft" -
- IV : "Gliders" - and -
- V : "Balloons and Airships"
As for our second volume, the album came complete with a little present, a detachable paper airplane model ready for assembly by its new owner. And here, courtesy also of Mr. Stuart Armold, is a scan of that very item.
Now this second group may simply be listed as aeroplanes "from other lands" - but if you look at our card, from that second group, it also has an Abt. I, namely : "Abt 1 Amerikan Staaten Serie B (12 Bilder) U.S.A. Militarflugzeuge" - which means `Group I. United States. Series B. (12 pictures) U.S.A. Military Aircraft`. So the full listing of this second part is
- I : USA
- II : English States, Canada, Australia, Egypt
- III : Western States
- IV : Southern States
- V : Northern States
- VI : Eastern States
- VII : Balkan - Asien
And many thanks again to Mr. Stuart Arnold for supplying the titles of parts III and V.
As for why these groups are not shown in these volumes, well it probably means that the compilers had not seen any cards from that second album, but their existence had been reported. Remember in those days there was not the great internet access that we had today, and no facility to put a card on a scanner and sent it across the world.
Topps [trade : bubble gum : O/S - USA] "Harry and the Hendersons" - stickers (1987) 20/22
So to our second Centenary of the week, which marks an occasion when a group of gold miners were in their cabin by Spirit Lake at Mount St. Helens in Oregon, only to find themselves surrounded by huge ape-like men, at least seven foot tall, who had thrown rocks at the cabin and attempted to force their way inside. Their response, sadly, was to try and shoot the invaders, and one was hit, but the rest ran off, hopefully unharmed. However, the next night they came back in force, and the miners were forced to flee as soon as dawn rose and the ape-men ran off.
Thus began the legend of "Big Foot". Now it may have been embroidered over the years, and the beings grown steadily in size until they are claimed to be over nine foot tall, but there is fact and proof of something odd, a photo, taken in 1967 by Roger Patterson, and included within Brooke Bond`s "Unexplained Mysteries" (1987) as card 21/40. One of these shots was re-drawn for card 8 of the 1994 set "American Realist" set called "Myth or Real", but all the other seventy-three cards which appear at the Trading Card Database/BigFoot are artists impressions and not based on the actual film footage. They also completely ignore our set, "Harry and the Hendersons" though, oddly, they do include a checklist of the cards, and stickers elsewhere in the database.
Now "Harry and the Hendersons" started as a film, which was released in 1987, and concerns a normal family from Seattle who meet Big Foot and take him home, causing all kinds of chaos. It won an Academy Award too, for Best Make-Up.
Naturally there was a tv version made, serialised on a weekly basis, and adding more adventures to the basic story. This tv series was also sent to Britain, but screened under a different title, of "Bigfoot and the Hendersons".
As the film was so popular, it led to this Topps card issue, and I am pleased to say that at this time you still got nine cards, one sticker, and a stick of gum inside each packet, so they are true "trade" cards. I would not say it was the best set ever, but I am definitely glad that I can add it to the index and gallery, just in case I never mention Big Foot again - though I am sure I will.
By the way, as far as I know, Big Foot was never mentioned in The X Files - though maybe he will be in the rebooted version which is currently being planned?
Donruss [trade; bubble gum : O/S - USA] "Disneyland" Puzzle back cards (1965) 27/66
Today we mark the opening, in 1955, of Walt Disney`s Anaheim, California, theme park "Disneyland", but also this set, which marks a decade since it opened.
Disneyland was Walt Disney`s dream, a land where everyone could relive being a child again, and en entire family play together. This site, his first theme park, was the only one that he was alive to have a hand in its construction and design, and so it is the closest to his vision of an ideal child`s paradise. By the time Disney World opened in Orlando, Florida, on October 1, 1971, he was dead.
The original site covers a hundred and sixty acres, and the money for it was made by screenings and tv rights for his television show, "Disneyland", as well as by his selling shop space within the not-yet-built park to companies who took the risk that the park would ever be built at all, let alone make them a profit.
The opening Ceremony was shown live on TV. Inside the park were just five areas, Adventureland, Frontierland, Fantasyland, Tomorrowland, and Main Street USA, the home of most of the shops that he had sold. There were thirty-five rides, and the oldest ride was King Arthur`s Carousel, which Disney had bought in; some of the parts of it were almost a hundred years old. Few of those rides are still there in their original form, or without a change of name - just thirteen, most of which are within Fantasyland. Apart from those, just one original ride remains in Adventureland (Jungle Cruise), one in Frontierland (Mark Twain`s Steamboat") and one in Tomorrowland ("Autopia").
There are two sets of Donruss "Disneyland", by the way, this set, where the backs are part of a larger image, and a set with blue printed text. I have found a checklist of the blue set at Trading Card Database / Disneyland Blue - but not tracked these down there yet.
These are still "trade" cards, because they were issued with gum, in a yellow packet which cost five cents. However this packet description could equally apply to both sets, so I am unsure whether the two were mixed together, or packaged separately.
I do know that this a a very popular set, but does not seem to be very well known outside card circles, so if you are speculator, it may be worth picking them up if you see them cheaply, and listing them on sites that are popular with Disney collectors. Even better, the images are not of the Disney characters, they also show the buildings of the park, and as we found out earlier, many of those have been changed or lost forever.
Topps [trade : bubble gum : O/S - USA] "Hocus Focus Magic Photos" (1948) 7/252 - R714-26-27
After not being able to show one of these intriguing cards during basketball week, I have managed to show one here, and tell a very fantastic tale as well, for here we have Clyde Grace "Wrong Way" Corrigan, always known as Douglas, a Texan of Irish descent, who, today, in 1938, took off to fly across America - and landed in Ireland.
It was a miracle he made it at all, because his aeroplane was hardly safe, had been refused a licence, he had no radio, too much fuel, and his fuel tanks leaked so badly that they filled the interior with fluid and with fumes - a situation which was rectified by Mr. Corrigan simply cutting a hole in the cockpit floor to get rid of both.
Today we know that it was not actually an error at all; what happened was that he was hungry to get a record, or at least fame, and had been refused permission to fly across the Atlantic, though he had been given an option of flying across from one side of America to the other, over land for safety. So he set off, ostensibly, doing what they requested, and got a bit lost along the way. He got his fame, and, luckily, nobody was hurt. And he was still well known enough to be on these cards ten years later - as well as on another Topps set "Scoop", issued in 1954.
Sounds like a win win to me.
Now these cards came out of the packet completely blank to one side, with the wording only visible. When you put water on them though, the image was revealed, as if by magic, hence the name. They were a curious idea, and they are tiny cards, only 7/8” x 1 7/16” in size. They are also rather a minefield to collect, because they were split into sports and non-sports cards, and then split again into nineteen sub-sets, including baseball, and including Babe Ruth. Each of these sub sets had a different letter, like ours is 7 of 9.L. However none of this is properly explained on the reverse of the card, and many early collectors probably had no idea that there were over two hundred of them to find.
Today we still struggle to complete our sets, and, I must also say, this is definitely not a set for purists, as they were often trimmed to make them squarer, as well as the fact that it is almost impossible to find cards of identical colour, as the colour depends on how much, or how little, water was applied in the attempt to bring the image up.
But you can see all the cards at the Trading Card Database / TMP - which backs up what I just said about the varying shades! - plus a packet, which is how I can reveal that their true name was intended to be "Hocus Focus Magic Photos". This makes it all the more intriguing that Jefferson Burdick appears to have listed them in his catalogue twice - as :
R714 - Topps Unclassified Cards
26 - Hocus Focus Cards. 1956. 1 x 1 5/8 photos
10 planes, 7 movies, 10 sport cars, 15 world leaders, 10 world wonders.27 - Magic Photos (256) 7/8 x 1 1/2, Album, about 1950
celebrities, Actresses, Actors, etc.
He did not value them very highly though, at just two cents a card. And the glaring omission here is any reference to there being baseball subjects.
Guerin-Boutron [trade : chocolate : O/S - France, Paris] "Celebrities Contemporaines" / "Contemporary Celebrities" (1919) 268/500?
And so to our final card of the week, and a calm, serene, ending it is, with the glide of ballet slippers along a varnished wooden floor, and the gentle squeaking of pastels, as the image is attempted to be captured for all time.
Today, in 1834, Edgar Degas, or Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, was born.
Now according to the Trading Card Database / Edgar Degas he appears on twenty-two cards, but the earliest of those was only issued in 2013. I have not been able to find him any earlier though, nor does it appear that any of his paintings and sketches have been immortalised as cards. Unless you know better?
So I have gone for this lady, Rosita Mauri, ballet de Sylvia, who does rather better on cards, being immortalised not only here, but by Felix Potin in his second album of 1908, and by Biscuits Pernot in their set of "Danseuses" - as well as on a card advertising "Aux Deux Passages", who we featured earlier in the week. In fact she is almost certainly on a lot of other European chromos and trade cards too, and she was actually born in Palma de Mallorca, Spain, on the 15th of September 1850, or around that date, as there is some confusion. She was christened María Isabel Amada Antonia Rosa Mauri Segura, though she often went by the name of simply Roseta Mauri y Segura, and, especially on cards, where space was limited, as Rosita, or Rosa Mauri.
She danced in all genres, including Flamenco, but she is best known today as a prima ballerina, and perhaps as a ballet teacher, which is what she became when her feet would not allow her to perform for herself.
For some reason she was very popular with artists, and, though I picked her out of several ballerinas, knowing nothing of her story, I am rather thrilled that one of those turns out to be our man Edgar Degas - in "Fin d`Arabesque" (1877), "Danseuse sur la Scene" and "Prima Ballerina"(1878) and "Ballet vu d`une loge de l`Opera" (1885).
She also had several lovers, including a French politician, who shot himself because they had a row whilst dining and he thought she would never come to him again. And, even more strangely, he was a fellow student of Edgar Degas.
I love it when the threads connect.
This week's Cards of the Day...
...were also suggested by a reader, who, again, also supplied a lot of the facts for the text, and the cards.
So off we go, on a hunt for extreme temperatures, because on the tenth of July, 1913, what stands as the hottest temperature ever officially accepted by the World Meteorological Organization as being recorded on our planet was 56.7 °C (134.1 °F). The location of this scorching event was at a place called Furnace Creek Ranch in Death Valley.
Now there was actually a higher temperature, of 136 degrees Celsius, in Libya, in 1922, and at one time this was the world record, but this claim was subsequently disallowed, but not until 2012, because of inaccuracies with the recording equipment. However, the same sort of equipment was also used for the Death Valley claim, and this has led to some scientists failing to recognise that too.
Coincidentally, in August 2020 and July 2021, the temperature in Death Valley hit 130 degrees Celsius. And there was a temperature that beat even this, but we will find out about this later in the week.
Saturday, 6th July 2024
The clue here was really obscure, but it goes back to 1886, when some workers at Woolwich Arsenal, a South London armament factory, were a bit bored on their off time, and so they started kicking a ball about. This led to them deciding to become a proper football team, and taking their name as "Dial Square", because above the main factory entrance was a square sundial. Their first game was on December 11, 1886, and they won, 6-0. And, not long after, they were rechristened "Royal Arsenal".
As for our connection, on a sunny day, the sun`s rays show the time on the sun dial, by casting a shadow. They travel far to do this, almost 150 million kilometres, and so by the time those sun rays reach us, they are much cooled - luckily, as on the outside of the sun it can reach 10,000 degrees F (or 5,600 degrees C). At the centre, by the way, it is estimated to be 27,000,000 degrees F (or 15,000,000 C).
This is just one of many cards that were sold in the same kind of way as what are now known as Baines Shields (or Medals) - in packets, each of which had a certain number of cards inside.
Several sites can be found online, and a particularly interesting one, albeit short, is at Brentford FC Memorabilia / Battock - it also shows some of the different backs, and they peg the number in the set at 109. Another reasonably small site is at 1920s Heaven / Battock - this one supplies us with a later address as well, in SW1, and also splits the cards into three groups, namely Series 1 (1923), Series 2 (1924) and Series 3 (1925).
In our original British Trade Index, issued in 1962, the description is rather vague, reading :
J. C. Battock, London, E.C.2
Cards sold in packets, about 1915 - 25
CRICKET AND FOOTBALL CARDS (A). Md. 70 x 58. Coloured or Black and White. Various series. ... BEV-1
However in our British Trade Index part III, issued in 1986, things are a bit more informative and the text there reads :
J. C. Battock - BEV in 1
BEV-1 (Cricket and Football Cards - Coloured). There are two sets. Eight backs, as follows, wording in different styles for each set. :
A. "Battock`s Football and Jersey Cards ...
B. "Cover Cards ..."
C. "Guessing Numbers..."
D. Puts Down ..."
E. "Save Battock`s Cards ..."
F. "Snap Cards ..."
G. "Skimmer Cards ... "
H. "We will send you ,,, "
-1. Set 1. Coloured backgrounds. Backs E and F indicate 54 Cricket and 54 Football cards in the set.
Now I am going to patch the tables in later, to save time.
-2. Set 2. White backgrounds. Back E indicates that the 18 subjects marked " in the listing would be exchanged for a football or a jersey. Five of these have not been studied and may have been issued in reduced quantities. 50 listed below, all Football Cards. Only eight basic designs were used.
another table
Cricket and Football Cards - Uncoloured (A). 70 x 60. Back "Battock`s Painting and Crayoning Competition", embodying form for entry ... BEV-2
There are a couple of additions to the above lists in British Trade Index three, published in 1997, namely
BEV-1-1. (Cricket Cards). No.8 (Wellington) is known with back E
BEV-1-2. (Football Cards). No.28 (Merthyr Town) is known with back H.
Add : 51. Southport. E.
By the time of our updated British Trade Index all this is brought together, as :
J. C. Battock - London E.C.2.
Cards sold in packets, about 1915-25. Although commercial, these issues continue to be listed as they are so widely collected.
CRICKET AND FOOTBALL CARDS (A). 70 x 58. Unnd. Coloured on a) coloured background, b) white background. Eight backs known, with wording in style different to BAT-200. See HB-85. ...BAT-200
CRICKET AND FOOTBALL CARDS (A). 70 x 58. Unnd. B & W on white background. Back "Battock`s Painting and Crayoning Competition", embodying form for entry. Fronts were to be painted and sent in. See HB-86. ... BAT-210
I have to say that I think the end of the first group above should have read "different to BAT-210". There is something else which puzzles me too, and that is whether anyone owns any of the hand coloured cards? If you do please tell us, because it would be interesting to find out if they were returned or not.
Sunday, 7th July 2024
The clue here was "Record", because we are speaking of record temperatures.
You may be surprised to learn that these professional records only started to be kept in the 1880s, though we do have records of weather and natural phenomenon from before that time, and we know that they were used by farmers to foretell the signs as to when bad or good weather could be coming, so that harvests may be picked, or animals brought in from the hillsides or far distant fields . However these were kept on a local basis, and they were not scientifically proven.
There is also that famous heat-related saying, "Horses sweat, men perspire, ladies glow", and here we have the first two of the genders. Sadly I do not know if we have all three, and the horse was a mare, for there seems no records of the courageous steed, all I have discovered is that the competitors only met their partners twenty minutes before the event after a random draw, presumably from a hat. Anyway despite this card saying that Senor Escobedo won the steeplechase, he did not win the entire event, which was actually, though not mentioned here, the Modern Pentathlon, ending up in twenty-second place overall.
So I thought this was the partner to the set we had the other week in our newsletter - scroll down to Sunday the 22nd of June - that is billed as Cadet Sweets` "Record Holders of the World". However in our British Trade Index part two looking at "C.S. Ltd. Slough" has a redirect, to "- see Cadet Sweets". The only problem is that there is only one set listed, as :
RECORD HOLDERS OF THE WORLD. Sm. 65 x 34. Nd. (50) ... CAF-14
That does not entirely seem to fit our set, which says it is the first series of twenty five cards, and the truth is that if you read this you did not go far enough; it is only if you continue to the next page that section 3 says :
RECORD HOLDERS OF THE WORLD. 1st Series. Sm. 66 x 36. Nd. (25) ... CAF-22
This is all cleared up by the British Trade Index part three (and repeated in part four), where there is a heading for "C.S. Ltd", but no sets listed, only "- See Cadet Sweets (Sets CAF-21 to CAF-23 in II). And if you do just that, you will find our set.
However, in the updated British Trade Index, you are back to square one, for the only listing is the set of fifty. This puzzled me, too, until I looked for C.S. Ltd. and found them at the front of the "C" section, where it says "C.S. Ltd., Slough - See Comet Sweets." And under Comet Sweets, there is :
RECORD HOLDERS OF THE WORLD. 1st Series. Sm. 66 x 36. Nd. (25). `C.S. Ltd` ... COM-080
So now I am confused all over again.
Monday, 8th July 2024
At this point we ought to discuss the temperature systems that we use.
Now Fahrenheit or "F" is named after Gabriel Fahrenheit, who was born in 1686. He has a link to our man Evangelista Torricelli as he also experimented with mercury, making the first mercury thermometer, for which he also had to lay down a temperature scale of how to record the highest and lowest.
The other letter, the "C" has several claimants for it. One is Celsius, after Anders Celsius, born in 1701, who devised a slightly different scale making zero the hottest and a hundred degrees for the coldest. Another is Jean Pierre Cristin, born in 1683, who reversed this and made the zero cold. And lastly we have Centigrade, which is not named after a person at all, it simply combines two latin words, the "cent" or hundred, at one end of the scale, and the "grade", or "gradient" of the degrees.
This card introduces us to the barometer, a vital tool for recording extremes of weather, but not just for professionals, anyone can become a weather watcher with this. How it works, very briefly, is that the air moves about us constantly, and the weight is also ever changing.. This machine magically measures that weight, or pressure, and tells us.
Now the first ever barometer was created by the man on this card, Evangelista Torricelli, in 1643, quite by accident. He was trying to find out why some water refused to do what he wanted, which was simply to be pumped up a tube. He had thought of a way to do it, but was stymied, because the way he had discovered needed a glass tube that was sixty feet long. This was quite impracticable, and so, being a scientist, he decided to work on what would happen if instead of using the water he used a much heavier substance, mercury - which would require a tube of just under three feet. This was designed, and used, and it worked.
This sort of barometer is also known as a storm glass, and they were widely used in the seventeenth century. They are quite rudimentary, and you can only record the changes on a daily, rather than an hourly basis. Why they are connected with storms is that when a storm comes the air is raised into the upper atmosphere, making its pressure, or weight, drop. However when it is cold, the air is sluggish, sitting heavier above us, making its pressure less. We also know, though, that the pressure changes on a daily basis, irrespective of extremes of weather, simply due to the sun heating the atmosphere and then cooling off in the mid afternoon, and the moon being of a lower temperature, but cooling off still further under cover of darkness.
And Evangelista Torricelli also discovered a vital part of fluid dynamics, that being that the speed at which fluid leaks from a hole depends on the square root of the height of fluid which is still above that hole.
Now "Aux Deux Passages" was a department store, founded in Lyon in 1859 by a man called Henri Perrot. It started by moving into a single building at 36 Rue de la Republique, and then, by 1871, expanding to the other buildings on either side, making the full address 34-38 Rue de la Republique. Mainly it was a clothes store, but also sold toys, novelties, and household goods. It also printed regular catalogues that shoppers could take home and order from, without wasting time in the store.
In 1965 it was bought out by Printemps, a similarly aged company, founded in 1865, in fact the founder had worked at Au Bon Marche. They also have a claim to shopping fame, because they were the first company to have regular "sales" of unsold stock before the new season began. They also offered catalogues of their goods, from 1868. Their best season was Spring, after which they were named, and they would give away a small bunch of violets to anyone who made a purchase. Then, in 1881 almost the entire store burned down - and was rebuilt. A second fire followed, in 1921, after which it was again rebuilt, but this time with the added attraction of escalators. Perhaps because their story was constant change, embracing the new and modern, they set about planning major alterations to the reasonably untouched interior of Aux Deux Passages, redesigning the layout from a blank canvas, moving the walls, and removing many of the architectural features, including the huge nineteenth century stairways. This was not popular with historians though, and did not begin right until 1988. And since then, even Printemps have changed hands, several times, most recently, in 2013, when they were bought by Qatari investors.
This card is part of a set, and it is thought that the central "Nouveautes" is the set title, though that means novelties and I have a feeling they used the term more for new discoveries, in a scientific way. So far I know of few, and they are unnumbered, so I list them by the inventor`s surname. And if you know of more please tell us. Those found so far are :
- L`Abbe de L`Epee
- Archimede [s]
- Jenner
- Torricelli
Tuesday, 9th July 2024
From extremes of heat to extremes of cold, and here we have the Antarctic, where, on July the 21st, 1983, the temperature in Vostok was -89.2 degrees C (or -128.6 degrees F).
The coldest ever recorded in the British Isles was -27.2 degrees, and it happened twice, both in Scotland, the first time was at Braemar on the 10th of January 1982, and the second at a weather station site called Altnaharra No.2, on the 30th of December 1995.
The issuer of this card will be instantly familiar to chocolate connoisseurs. However, the name can be confusing - many people think it is named after the area of that name in North Eastern France, or in some way related to the Gold Coast in Africa. You are getting much warmer with that one, as though it is actually a Belgian company, founded in 1883, the chocolate was named after the African region, now Ghana, where the cacao beans came from. There is also a little clue on the packets, and this card, look for the elephant.
Now the founder Charles Neuhaus sold the firm to the Buiswal-Leclef family only six years after he started it, and they were merged with Michiels in 1906, at which time the company was renamed to "Alimenta". That name appears on our card, right at the bottom, but so does Cote D`Or, which was kept because it was already a famous brand. .
Our card dates from a fair while after that though, and uses photographs from the second Belgian Antarctic Expedition of 1957 to 1959. The leader was Gaston de Gerlache, or to be more correct, Baron Gaston de Gerlache de Gomery, and he was indeed following in his father`s footsteps, for Adrien de Gerlache had been the leader of the first Belgian Antarctic Expedition in 1899.
During the expedition, they set up the King Baudouin Base, one of many areas which were designed to house scientists and researchers as they explored this desolate region. The American one was right at the South Pole, and named, after two explorers, Amundsen-Scott. The Russian base, coincidentally for the subject of today, was called the Vostok Base, and it was right in the middle of the East Antarctic icecap. I imagine this could have been where that lowest temperature was taken. However the Belgian one was rather precariously sited on a floating ice shelf just off the coast by Breid Bay, and it needed reconstructing as early as 1964. By early 1957 it had been decided to abandon it, and build another, 200 km inland, in Queen Maud Land, which they named Princess Elisabeth Station.
In December 1958, Gaston de Gerlache and his team were involved in a flying accident, 250 km from the base. They were rescued, five days later, by a Russian pilot.
There is an album for this set, but it is hard to spot because it looks very much like a book. However if you turn to the inside you can see that it uses these cards for the illustrations. It is quite sought after, by card collectors and polar expedition ones.
Wednesday, 10th July 2024
This card shows us a weather station, being examined by small boys, perhaps even at their school. Weather forecasting at that time was quite adequate, and had been developing since the 1920s.
However, in 1950 we saw the first computerised forecasts take place, and they would mean not only that the forecast was more accurate, but that it could be sent, in real time, to head office. This machine was called ENIAC, this being an acronym for Electronic Numerical Integrator & Computer, and it had been developed and funded by the American government during the Second World War, and it was a joint effort by Americans and Norwegians.
They actually used a far simpler system than we do today, but deliberately, because the machine was not capable of too much complexity, and also they felt it would both speed up the results, and not use too much of the memory of the machine. In fact, despite this, it still took almost a whole day to get a result.
This set is one of thirteen that was issued by Priory Tea & Coffee Co. Ltd,., of London S.E.1, in a crafty little tie up with the I-Spy series of spotters books and also the News Chronicle and Daily Dispatch newspapers who ran an I-Spy Column every day. I do not know how Priory Tea managed to ally themselves with the I-Spy series. These are always thought to have began in the 1950s as a kind of club, presided over by a real Native American called Big Chief I-Spy - except it was a retired headmaster called Charles Warrell, who had made the first few books all by himself, starting in 1948. He then sold the idea to the Daily Mail, who started publishing a regular column, though they seem to have, quite quickly, moved them along to the News Chronicle. Mind you, when the News Chronicle stopped in 1960, the Daily Mail seem to have got them back. And, by the way Mr. Warrell lived to be 106 years old.
The idea came from the game, where one person thinks of an item and the others have to guess it. In the books the items were shown, and you marked them off. Each item gains a point, and when you had spotted all the items you would send them up and receive in exchange a feather and an order of merit. Simple, maybe, but by the mid 1950s there were half a million members in the I-Spy Tribe.
The sets are described in our original British Trade Index part two, as :
Priory Tea & Coffee Co. Ltd., London, S.E.1. Cards issued 1957-64. Small size 69 x 37 m/m. Special album issued to house the 13 series, listed below in order used in album. Series numbers appear only on album sheets.
SERIES 1 "I SPY OUT AND ABOUT". Sm. Nd. (24) ... PTT-1
SERIES 2 "I SPY PETS". Sm. Nd. (24) ... PTT-2
SERIES 3 "I SPY PEOPLE IN UNIFORM". Sm. Nd. (24) ... PTT-3
SERIES 4 "I SPY DOGS". Sm. Nd. (24) ... PTT-4
SERIES 5 "I SPY CARS". Sm. Nd. (24) ... PTT-5
SERIES 6 "I SPY FLOWERING TREES". Sm. Nd. (24) ... PTT-6
SERIES 7 "I SPY MEN AT WORK". Sm. Nd. (24) ... PTT-7
SERIES 8 "I SPY BRIDGES". Sm. Nd. (24) ... PTT-8
SERIES 9 "I SPY CYCLES AND MOTORCYCLES". Sm. Nd. (50) ... PTT-9
SERIES 10 "I SPY WILD FLOWERS". Sm. Nd. (50) ... PTT-10
SERIES 11 "I SPY AIRCRAFT". Sm. Nd. (50) ... PTT-11
SERIES 12 "I SPY BIRDS". Sm. Nd. (50) ... PTT-12
SERIES 13 "I SPY CARS". Sm. Nd. (50) ... PTT-13
Now on the cards it tells us that each album takes two sets - and further information appears in our updated British Trade Index where it says "Special album issued to house all 13 sets. Albums to take one or two sets were available for 6d." And it also gives me the dates of issue, where the "Sm." formerly was, series 1 to 4 being issued in 1957, series 5 in 1958, and series 6, 7 and 8 in 1959, all being of twenty-four cards, then series 9 to 13, which started in 1960 and were released on an annual basis thereafter, all being sets of fifty cards.
I cannot believe we have never featured any of these before, so I look forward to sharing them all with you in the very near future!
Both our final original British Trade Index, part IV, and our updated version also mention that there was a final "End of Series" card, wording only, asking "Are your sets of cards complete?" so it must have been a last chance saloon to get those missing odds out of the stock or remainders that Priory Tea still held. And there is also another issue, a "Bingo Slogan Competition", printed by letterpress in black only - of which eighteen cards have been seen so far.
Even more interestingly, our updated version also mentions an advertisement card of 1910 - though a quick look into the Priory Tea story online reveals that they were only incorporated in May 1932 - and that they are now dissolved.
Thursday, 11th July 2024
Temperature may not seem to be so important on the sea, but weather certainly is, and never more so in the days of the sail driven ships, when no wind meant no movement, and too much wind would blow them far off course. And, to this day, wind speed is measured in knots, just like the speed of those ships.
Hurricanes and cyclones cause most of the record winds at sea, and the highest wind ever recorded was in the Eastern Pacific Ocean during Hurricane Patricia, in October 2015. These winds frequently hit 215 mph, or, for the land lubbers 187 knots.
The fastest ever wind speed, on land, in the world was just faster than this, at almost 220 knots, or almost 253 mph, - this was recorded on April the 10th, 1996, during a cyclone, at an unmanned weather station on Barrow Island, Australia.
And as for the United Kingdom, the highest gust happened at the top of Cairngorm on March the 20th, 1986, and that was 150.3 knots (or 173mph).
This card is not rare, but it is a treasure, and it has many things that make it collectable, firstly the weather flags, and then there are the bottles, dancing in the middle, and then it appeals to collectors of medical memorabilia, because they have cunningly and cleverly linked each flag to a common bodily condition, for example "Local Rain or Snow" links to "for colds and coughs use Ayer`s Cherry Pectoral", and "Stationary Temperature" says "Use Ayers Pills for all stationary and inactive conditions of the bowels and digestive organs". You can just imagine the fun that children would have had with this, but also it must have definitely helped to teach them the flags.
Now Dr. James Cook Ayer & Co. was based in Massachusetts, but he was born in Connecticut, in May 1818. The move occurred after his mother remarried, and sent James and his brother to an uncle. James went on to study medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, but never became a doctor; his great love was the chemistry, the combining of the substances and the making of the medicines. For some reason, perhaps his advertising, including cards and other giveaways, he soon made a name for himself, and was able to open a factory in Lowell.
In fact, in 1874, he stood for Congress, but he was defeated, and he never again attempted to become involved in politics.
Friday, 12th July 2024
So, bringing our pursuit of keeping an eye on the weather, here we have an artificial eye, launched in April 1960. This machine was the world`s first weather satellite, and it was called TIROS I, being an acronym for Television Infra-red Observation Satellite.
The idea of the satellite was that it roamed above the planet, taking pictures, and sending them down to scientists below it on Earth, who could see storms developing much easier, and over a far greater area of the planet, than had ever been possible before. Think of that man, or probably a boy, up in the crows nest amongst the rigging of his tall ship, looking out to sea to try and spot a storm, whilst knowing that most of the sky was out of sight.
TIROS I did not get off to such a good start, as its first image did not show the weather as a clear picture, but as a fuzzy one, of clouds across America. However a few days later all was redeemed, with the first photograph of a typhoon, a thousand miles away from Australia.
I am not quite sure what it had to do with putting a man on the moon though.
Now this was a really fiendish card for you to identify, because it was the Canadian version, issued by O-Pee-Chee. But this set was issued by Topps, as well as by A & B.C. Gum - all in the same year. Those links take you to the illustrated checklists of each one of those versions, courtesy of the Trading Card Database - but nowhere do they link them all together.
We have also featured the A. & B.C Gum version as a Card of the Day, on the 27th of August, 2023
And so, kind readers, that closes another thrilling instalment of our newsletter saga. Which I have found to be a very interesting one. There are omissions, I failed to track down the missing countries in the second Garbaty "Eroberung der Luft", but maybe someone knows of them, and I also did not get time to scan the Battock`s listings. Never mind, because there is still plenty of content for you to chew over until midnight strikes again next week and another newsletter slides into place over the top of this one.
Thanks for tuning in, whomsoever you are....