Introduction to collecting Playing Cards.

Swap cards are mostly from a deck of normal playing cards. Collectors take one of each design or pattern from the deck for their collection. Usually there are a pair, but sometimes there may be four decks in a box, with different colours or pictures in each deck. Sometimes there is no 'pair' for a card, if just one pack was produced by the manufacturer, using the same pattern for the entire deck of cards. (Swap cards were also produced by Coles and Woolworths in the 1950's. These are now rare, and highly valued among collectors.)

A matching pair of cards can be the same design with variations in colour, or different pictures with the same kind of border to show they are a pair. There may even be four varieties of the one pattern in different colours. The subjects on the front of cards are endless. Some collectors only save a certain topic, such as animals, or just one kind of animal. Old fashioned or vintage-style pictures such as crinoline ladies and Old Masters paintings are popular. Other collectors specialise in Jokers or Aces.

In 1956, Coles Stores produced four separate sets of cards to commemorate the Olympic Games in Melbourne. There are 28 cards in each set, with flags of the competing nations, flora, fauna, industry, and sporting events pictured on them.

Saturday, 28 September 2013

Australian Coles cards. 1956 Olympic Games

Here is the first lot of my Coles collection - the cards brought out to commemorate the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne. Sorry the images are crammed so close together. It took me ages to photograph the pages, then when I got them onto the hard drive I discovered I had the camera on the wrong setting and the pictures were too big. So I had to reduce each one manually, and then when I posted them here I selected another wrong format so all the photos ran in together - grrrr! If you click on them it will bring the picture closer/make it larger for you to see. I'll see if I can improve on this with the next lot. I've photographed everything in the album but there is too much to post all in one hit, so I'll put some more up in a day or so.
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Tuesday, 24 September 2013

A note to my blog visitors!

Hi Julie and the other visitors to this blog - and thank you for your comments. Sorry I've been so tardy about continuing to post here, but having just read your comments from earlier this month, I've taken out my albums again and will get busy scanning in the next day or so. I have recently put all my Coles cards in one album, so I may do some cutting and pasting with the blog, and make new posts with the Coles cards so they are all together. Wish I could get hold of that Coles card catalogue! I used to be in the Card collectors society but dropped out a few years ago because I couldn't justify buying any more cards after my collection got into the thousands :-o Thanks again - I'll be back soon! Gina
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