KRUCKOW - NSF - SN

There's no doubt that Kruckow was the first to create this pattern and the Nederlandsche Speelkaartenfabriek (NSF) must have seen and copied it. Although the figures are slightly smaller, the copying was done meticulously. Only very small details differ and even the color scheme is close to the original. But there's a most remarkable difference to be found on the queens. Where the Kruckow ladies show a lot of skin, in the Netherlands the maker was a bit more prude and covered them up. Only the Danish queen of diamonds was apparently dressed decent enough.
The shown Dutch cards are from a deck, which was most likely old stock from the NSF. Founded in 1906 the NSF was declared bankrupt in 1912. Their machinery, lithographic stones, everything else necessary to produce playing cards and their stock was taken over by Faddegon & Co, a producer of paper and carton products. A subsidiary company was founded by Faddegon and was named the Speelkaartenfabriek Nederland (SN).
The NSF cards can be recognized by a few features, of which the use of black indices in the red suits is the easiest to distinguish. Already before the old  stock was completely sold, SN started printing these decks and the indices got the same color as the suit.

So now some courts to compare, ladies first........

and a few other courts to compare...

		The SN deck came with a set of international aces. In a recently received sample book  it's titled "Nederlandsche Exportkaart" and was available in whist and piket, a game for 32 cards. The wrappers show the SN logo, but the content was the old NSF stock, for which a more rigid sort of carton was used.
		Here below a SN Export deck from around 1920. Export decks were not only published with this set of international aces, but also with a set with scenes from the Dutch Indies. Both sets also exist in a colored version.