ST. LOUIS GIRLS PLAY A CHEAP TRICK

3 early photographic Pinup decks
from St. Louis, MO.

-DECK 1-

This small exposition was triggered, when we saw a pinup deck on Ebay. From the pictures we could see that the deck was new to us, but at the same time the joker looked very fimiliar, although we were sure that we didn't have it. The deck was titled "New Exotic Models of All Nations", which sounded vaguely familiar too. Just to satisfy our curiosity we decided to bid on it and.........brought it home.

Now that we held the box, saw the backdesign and read the name "Frederic Enterprises, St. Louis, MO", we were positive that we had other decks by this publisher. We found 2 decks in our collection. Both are early photographic pinup decks. Although these were published by the "Novelties MFG. & Sales Corp. from St. Louis, MO", the lettering on the boxes and their dimensions are exactly the same. As there are other similarities between the decks too, it's safe to assume that all 3 decks were published by the same publishing company and probably were made by the same manyfacturer too. Maybe there will have been a couple of years between the publication of the first and the third deck, but all come from the late 1950's or early 1960's.

wanna SEE THE BOXES ?

The first deck is titled "Fifty-two Art Studies" and is shown here below. It is probably the earliest one and comes from the days that depicted nudity was only acceptable when it was called "art". Usually the models are photographed inside a studio with "art" objects or in "art" poses. But according to the extra joker, we're dealing here with "distinct art studies", that will be "an example of modern photography at its finest" and "invaluable in discussions, forums, etc.".  

Mostly the models are completely nude, but only their breasts are exposed. Anything else exposed, such as a hint of pubic hair, will have been scrupulously airbrushed away. It's the spirit of a time, that we both remember well, and that's probably why these early photo decks are still attractive to us.

The company's "trademark" seems to be a wolf.
In each deck there is one on the backdesign and one on the joker.

Click on the aces to see the numbercards of each suit!

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