Help identifying playing cards manufacturer - Australian ?

[lemonpromotions]

Hey there, this is my first post so please forgive me if I have posted to the wrong place. Basically I am a UK collector learning all the time and I have picked up a pack whose ace and joker I do not recognize and cannot track down at any of the usual sites. I have attached the ace and joker and wonder if anyone had any ideas who the manufacturer is ? Thanks for any and all of your time, and its good to find a new home.....

[The Quadfather]

Hi there, and welcome to the forum! It's always good to see a fellow Brit on these boards!

Do you have a picture of the tuck box at all? And did you buy them from a shop or online like on eBay? Most of the cards you can buy from a shop in England are waddingtons.

[lemonpromotions]

Hi there,

Thanks for getting back to me - please see attached backs and pack pics

Yes Waddingtons are still sold in a lot of shops, and being in Leeds the cards and artwork pop up all over the place

[Don Boyer]

If the cards are advertising for an Australian company, there's a good chance the deck company is also Australian.

Also consider that since it's a vintage deck, there's a strong chance you're looking at a deck that's no longer in production.

Have you tried websites like 52 Plus Joker or World of Playing Cards?

[Joker and the Thief]

When I first saw the title of your post I assumed it may have been a Queen's slippers deck. That is definitely an Australian deck though.  However I have never seen anything like it. It looks quite old and judging from the style of the typography I'm thinking it was printed sometime after the war. 1950's - late 70's is my guess... I'm leaning more towards the 60's and 70's though.

A very striking back design to say the least.

[lemonpromotions]

Thanks for all the replies.

I got in touch with one of the Australian card groups and this is what I got back so far:

"Well, they were printed by Reed Paper Products, which is now Spicers, here in Australia. Best guess on the date is between 1935 and 1940. Our club has dealt with Spicer before. Unfortunately at some point, someone decided there was no need to keep hold of their archives. As a result they have no information on their own productions. This leave them in a unique position that they come to collectors - like us - to get information on their history."

[Don Boyer]

Thanks for all the replies.

I got in touch with one of the Australian card groups and this is what I got back so far:

"Well, they were printed by Reed Paper Products, which is now Spicers, here in Australia. Best guess on the date is between 1935 and 1940. Our club has dealt with Spicer before. Unfortunately at some point, someone decided there was no need to keep hold of their archives. As a result they have no information on their own productions. This leave them in a unique position that they come to collectors - like us - to get information on their history."

Ironically enough, USPC is often in the same position these days.  They used to maintain their archives and operate a museum on-site in Cincinnati, but with the changes of ownership, the museum was shuttered, the works on display were practically raided by some of the employees and the largely-neglected-until-recently archives are in a state of disarray, to the point where sometimes they can't even identify their own work from years back.  Remember the Dragon Back from Bicycle, though to be a very old but unprinted Bicycle design discovered in the archives?  It's actually a Tally-Ho back from sometime in the 1920s-'30s.  But then again, they also couldn't tell the difference between an Old Fan Back and an Expert Back when they first printed the Distressed version of the Expert Back deck months ago - they went through the trouble of print a corrected version of the deck with the correct back on it and with fewer "distress effects" on the cards.