26: PLAYING CARDS: RARITY, VALUE, DATING, SELLERS & eBAY [REVISED 20.10.14]

THIS PAGE IS NOW TO BE FOUND IN A REVISED FORM AT:  http://www.wopc.co.uk/blogs/kenlodge/playing-cards-rarity-value-sellers
SOME OF THE CONTENT HAS BEEN TRANSFERRED TO A MORE DETAILED PAGE ON DATING AT:  http://www.wopc.co.uk/blogs/kenlodge/41-a-guide-to-dating-playing-cards

Unlike stamps, bank notes and possibly cigarette cards, there is very little known about the size of print runs of most packs of cards.   The Waddington archive contains some information about some of their production, and there is information about tax revenue from playing cards even back in the 19th century, but most of the printing records have long disappeared.   This lack of reliable records means that no-one is in a position to produce the equivalent of the Stanley Gibbons stamp catalogues for cards.   Just as well, I say, or the dealers would be trying to manipulate the market more than they do now.

Rare is not a term to be used lightly and, in fact, it's probably better not to use it at all.   Fairly uncommon, unusual and similar terms are preferable in that they make no claims as to how many such items there might be in the world.   Indeed, some of the sellers on eBay, in particular, make ludicrous claims about rarity.   From what has appeared on eBay during the past two or three years it's possible to deduce that even some mid to late 19th century packs are pretty common.   I would want to know on what basis the claims of rarity are made.   One of the most obvious metrics is how often one has seen the pack in question.   But who is to say whose experience of observing playing cards is better or more valid than someone else's?   Length of time might be one criterion.   My own gauge of rarity relates partly to what I know of the existing information about production and tax revenue and how often I've seen a particular pack;  in my case this experience of seeing cards goes back to about 1945, so a span of some 68 years observing and admiring cards (not necessarily owning them).   Useful though this is for me, I can't expect others to rely on my say-so or even believe me, so it all boils down to an individual's assessment of a pack, which (including my own) may sometimes be incorrect.

BY THE WAY the erect feather AS by Goodall is NOT RARE;  the recent claims on eBay are wrong and misleading.   Who invented that fairy story?   When I pointed its relatively common occurrence to one eBay seller, this is the response I got.   I reproduce it here as it appeared (including mistakes).

" To clarify my statement. The Ace with the raised feather was only produced for 3 yrs 1862/5 during that period Goodall were manufacturing approx 330,000 decks per yr, so a total of approx 1 million decks in total.  The common Ace of spades was introduced in 1865 and ran untill 1945 under the de la Rue manf from 1922. Production figures for that period are approx

300 Million therefore the raised feather version was only produced on 1% of all the decks produced giving the age of the raised feather version, I would say its rare compared with later version. This info was given to me by my partner who is an avid collector of Goodall cards, over 1200 decks in his collection, and for your info he as approx 50 decks of raised feather.

  Hope this is helpfull  "

This is not the way to work out (relative) rarity.   You have to compare like with like.   In this case it means comparing the number of erect feather aces with the roughly contemporaneous ones, in particular the one that became the normal one, with a lower feather.   But such aces have to have square corners and no indices to be remotely comparable.   Dragging in figures (from where?) up to the 1940s makes no sense at all;  it would be just as helpful to compare erect feather aces with the number of baked beans Heinz made during the 20th century!   I would have thought having 50 examples of the item under consideration was a bit of a give-away!   The dating issue is taken up below.

And where does value come into all this?   Well, real value in my view is the position a pack holds in the history and development of cards right up to the present day, in other words its relevance to other packs of a similar type.   Monetary value, on the other hand, is a personal opinion.   Every collector should be an expert on what he or she is prepared to pay for a particular pack.   But there is no such thing as an absolute value (for anything, not just playing cards).   And collecting as an 'investment' is a mug's game.

Sellers' descriptions of packs are often misleading:  quite often unfounded claims (e.g. of rarity) are made, and the descriptions are embroidered to make the cards sound more desirable than they are.   The best presentations on eBay are those which modestly make no claims and, in particular, those that give good illustrations of what's on offer.   The potential buyer can then see clearly for him/herself.   Incidentally, as far as the UK is concerned, items on offer on eBay (and elsewhere) are subject to the Trade Descriptions Act, so it is incumbent upon the seller to give accurate information, even if it's minimal.   There are, sadly, eBay sellers who won't listen to information which challenges their descriptions;  their listings are full of factual misrepresentations.  

My concern in all this is a desire to impart knowledge, something I have spent my life doing.   (How well, others have to judge.)   If someone knows a description of a pack of cards is inaccurate, then there is no problem, but I'm concerned about those who do not have the knowledge to make a proper assessment.   It is unsafe to rely solely on the descriptions of sellers.

And what are the cards that are commonplace?   Here's a selection from the 19th century.   The selection is based on production figures that have survived for the different makers.   The biggest makers in the 19th century were Hunt, Hall, Creswick, and later on Goodall, De La Rue, Bancks and Reynolds.   (For details, see page 30.)

Hunt/Bancks, c.1820-75

                            

          Reynolds, c.1830-85                                                         Reynolds, c.1865-80

De La Rue D4.1, c.1855-65

De La Rue, D5, c.1865-75 [top]

De La Rue, D6 (six courts turned), c.1870-1900 (later packs with indices) [bottom]

plus all later types (D7, D8, D9) until c.1927 are common.

Goodall G3 (unturned), c.1860-70

Goodall G4.1 (turned, cut down hats and crowns), c.1875-85

Goodall G6, c.1900-25

plus all other later types (G4, G5, G7 (bridge width), G8) until c.1925;  the last three are especially common.   Of course, if you add in features other than the courts, then people might want to pay more for such packs;  for example, whether the AS is Garter, Old Frizzle or a maker's ace, or if the back design has some significance.

I also see a lot of wrongly dated packs on offer on eBay.   Quite often I'm sure most collectors spot the errors, but those collectors who are fairly new to the game may have less information at their finger tips.         For example, you often see De La Rue packs on offer which are dated as 1890s, but which are from c.1930 - a poor piece of misrepresentation.   Here's one from eBay.

These are dated 1895 by the seller (very precise!), but, in fact, the AS has indices that were introduced only after De La Rue took over Goodall in 1922, so that's the earliest they could be and could be later still.

So here are a few guides to De La Rue, Goodall and a few, later Waddington cards with Goodall courts.

1. Pip and index types

2. Details of the manufacturer

There are extra indicators such as the postal district of the address given for Goodall's Camden Works.   Before De La Rue's take-over (1921/2) it's NW;  after the take-over it's EC1.   Quite a move for a building!!   The latter one is actually that of De La Rue's own Bunhill Row.   And Registered Trademark appears on the Goodall AS after the take-over from c.1925 onwards.   Goodall's Camden Works were sold in 1929, so any reference to it on boxes indicates a date of manufacture earlier than that.

As an example of misdating, I'll return to the message higher up the page that I was sent regarding the erect feather AS by Goodall.

Note the dates given.   The packs concerned are bézique packs, probably from a four-pack set.   These sets were introduced by Goodall in 1868, so 1862/5 is simply wrong.   So even if the calculation of rarity made sense, it falls in any case, as it is based on the wrong dates.    

Then there are the known dates of the individual makers.   These can be found in my book The standard English pattern and some details are on the plainbacks and wopc websites.   The four main British manufacturers have the following dates: De La Rue 1832-1970;  Goodall 1820-c.1956, though after 1922 their cards were, in fact, De La Rue products;  Waddington 1922-1995, with the No1 brand being continued by Winning Moves;  Universal/Alf Cooke 1925-1970.   De La Rue became a limited company in 1898 and Goodall in 1897, so any indication of that status (Ltd or Limd) must be after those dates.   Note, too, that any pack with Goodall courts and a Waddington AS must be after 1943, when the courts were transferred for printing by the Leeds firm after De La Rue's Bunhill Row factory was destroyed in the Blitz.

3. Jokers 

  

I did not deal with jokers in my book, but they can also be useful aids to identification and dating.   I give a few examples below.

From top left: 1/2. Obchodni Tiskarny (Czech), the left one is based on a pre-war Piatnik design and was used from c.1935-60, the right one was a close copy of Waddington's design and was used in the 1960s and 1970s;  3. Artex, Budapest, c.1960-70.

Middle row: 4. Waddington's original joker, c.1923-35;  5. Waddington's later design, printed in various versions, still in use today, c.1935 onwards;  6. the Alf Cooke/Universal joker, printed in black and white, c.1925-35, then in three colours c.1935-70, with minor variations.

Bottom row: 7. De La Rue's design, used without a frame c.1890-1910, then with a frame.   It's found with Goodall courts after the take-over, but seems to have been discontinued by c.1930.   8/9. Goodall, c.1935-55, then in colour, c.1956-70.   The original design goes back to the 1880s, but it seems to have been discontinued after Waddington bought out De La Rue.

Top: 10/12. A variety of Hong Kong/Chinese jokers, 1980-2014

Middle: 13. Trefl (Poland), 2014;  14. British Playing Cards Ltd, 1920-25;  15. A Goodall variant with a different arrangement of suits on the upheld card, c.1945-60.

Bottom: 16/17. A couple of jokers by Nascal, Argentina, c.1965;  18. Chinese wide, 2014.

4. Aces of spades

The details of English makers' ASs are given in my book and on the plainbacks website, in particular, in my contribution to the site on the right of the first page.   The AS is always useful, at least for determining chronological windows.   On the main part of the plainbacks website you can find dates for the different Garter aces, Old Frizzle and individual makers' ASs.   Below I give a few examples of Garter ASs.   John Berry put together a scheme for dating the different varieties from the existing records;  the full reference to his book is on the plainbacks website.   In addition, Paul Bostock and I have included an updated list of early ASs in our book Wood-block & stencil (details on my Home Page).

Hall (& Son) ASs with Type II courts

 

Gibson & Co, c.1770                                                                                           Exportation AS, c.1803

(From the Cuming Museum)

Old Frizzle lasted from 1828 until 1862, but within that period it is possible to differentiate on the basis of court card design.   For example, the Goodall Old Frizzle below has a double-ended court set (G1.1), so must date from the 1850s.

Reynolds' own AS designed after 1862 was modelled closely on Old Frizzle, so do watch out for the differences.   One obvious one is MANUFACTURED BY above the design rather than DUTY ONE SHILLING as on Old Frizzle.   The one illustrated below is for REYNOLDS & Co rather than REYNOLDS & SONS, which means it dates at the earliest to 1882, when the firm changed its name, shortly before the take-over by Goodall.   There is another peculiarity in Reynolds packs:  they use the special unnamed Isle of Man exportation ace of the Frizzle period.   With R1 courts this is likely to be from the 1858-62 period, as they were only issued in 1828 and 1858.   I thought they were the only firm to use this particular AS, but I now have one with a Whittaker pack, but equally unnamed.

One final note on Old Frizzle:  the one printed for De La Rue always had By His Majesty's letters patent printed at the foot.   This is a reference to William IV's granting the patent in 1831, but it does NOT mean that the cards are necessarily from his reign.   The patent was proclaimed on the De La Rue AS throughout the Old Frizzle period until 1862.

The ASs were part of the taxation system in Britain and tax stamps are another way of identifying cards from other countries, too, though not on the ASs.   The USA and all major continental European countries taxed playing cards at various times.   Sylvia Mann gives an outline of the main aids to identification in this way in her book Collecting Playing Cards.   An important source of further information about taxation, especially in relation to Germany, can be found on Peter Endebrock's website.   All the website links referred to on this page can be found on the first page of this blog.

5. Bridge score cards

In those packs where an extra, bridge-score card has been included, we find a very useful aid to dating.   If the pack contains an auction bridge score-card, it is likely to date from before 1928, when the first version of contract bridge scores was introduced.   If the no trump score in contract bridge is 35 points, then the pack dates from 1928-32;  if the no trump score is 40/30 alternating, then the pack dates from 1932-35;  finally, from 1935 onwards the no trump score is 40 for the first trick and then 30 for the rest.   Changes to the undertrick penalty scores (not vulnerable) and a score for holding four aces in no-trump hands were made in 1987.

6. Back designs

Finally, there are a lot of poor descriptions of backs on eBay.   Art Nouveau and Art Deco are STYLES not periods;  just because something was designed between 1890 and 1910 doesn't automatically make it Art Nouveau.   In fact, Art Nouveau was not as popular in the UK as on the Continent of Europe, and very few card backs were affected by it.   Here are two examples from eBay, neither of which are Art Nouveau, but are described as such and incorrectly dated 1890s.

   

The bottom pack has 'Limd' on the AS, so can only be after 1897 at the earliest;  it was sold by W H Smith on railway stations c.1910.

And here's a pair similarly described.

If you want to know what Art Nouveau is all about, just Google it!

Also, backs from the 1950s often have a flavour of pre-war Art Deco.   Again, the fronts of the cards can guide you here:  if a Waddington pack has Goodall courts, then it's from the 1950s or later.   Waddington took over the printing of all Goodall/De La Rue cards in 1941 after the De La Rue factory at Bunhill Row was destroyed in the Blitz.

[This paragraph is repeated in a revised form on page 14.]

For an exercise in dating some Goodall packs, see page 12.   See also page 34 for a fun example of a mixed pack from De La Rue.