Sports Girls Set and Checklist (N463/C190)

Posted on December 2, 2016 by Pre-War Cards

‘It’s In The Details’

Title	N463/C190 Sports Girls
Year	circa 1890
Size	1 1/2″ x 2 5/8″
Images	Color
Type	19th Century Tobacco
Number in Set	12

N463/C190 Sports Girls Overview

N463 Sports Girls This unique issue includes 12 cards featuring female football and cricket players. While the football cards can be considered rugby cards, as an American product after the invention of the sport, they are often classified as football cards.

Jefferson Burdick classified this set as N463 (with a Canadian issue as C190) in the American Card Catalog. But while he indicated the set was found with advertising for Old Port Plug, Cameron & Sizer, and Ogden’s, a fourth brand is also known as the cards have also been seen with the Gloria Cigarettes name. A fifth type is also known as well as some cards were apparently stock issues and have no tobacco name printed on them.

The cards feature six football/rugby poses and six cricket poses. The cricket poses are sometimes confused by some to be baseball issues. Part of the reason for that is because while others clearly depict women with cricket equipment, one of the cards for the bowler shows only a woman with a ball (which is subsequently misidentified as a baseball).

More Football Evidence

Finally, these same pictures were used in a die-cut issue likely produced either by Buchner or by Raphael Tuck and Sons. Ironically, that set provides additional evidence that these were primarily football cards instead of rugby cards.

A similar men’s Raphael Tuck and Sons die-cut issue was created similar to the women’s set. That set, the Giant Relief set, has a label printed attached to one player called ‘Football’. The women’s set is similar to that one and calling these football cards seems to be proper categorization.

Still, that is not certain and collectors considering these to be rugby issues could be themselves correct.

N463/C190 Sports Girls Checklist

Note that most of the cards do not have titles printed on them. The only titles are found on the Ogden’s cards. However, they can be applicable for all of the sets since all of the sets use the same pictures.