-7-
Also in 1945, right after VE Day (Victory in Europe), the ARRCO Playing Card Company from Chicago, USA, issued the Victory Playing Cards. There's a repeating series of 3 designs on the courts. They represent Uncle Sam, Lady Liberty and a soldier and sailor. There are two jokers in this deck. One is a standard ARRCO joker, but the other one shows Hitler and Mussolini.
The deck below was made by L. Biermans from Turnhout, Belgium, in 1945. It's called "Jeep" and the backside shows one. The courts have a standard Belgian-Genoese pattern, but the aces show military leaders.
I recognise fieldmarshal Montgomery and
general Eisenhower on Diamonds and Clubs. On Spades probably Stalin and on
Hearts -not a real resemblance- general De Gaulle? *
And guess who's the joker again?
* Thanks to our friend and fellow collector Michel Jeannin from France we now know that the name of the depicted French 5 star general is in fact De Lattre de Tassigny and not De Gaulle, who only had 2 stars as a general. General De Lattre de Tassigny was the French representative who signed the German capitulation in 1945 in Berlin, and later he was the civilian and military governor in French Indochina (now Vietnam). There he was struck by cancer and was brought to Paris for hospitalization. He died shortly afterwards in 1952.
-1- -2-
-3- -4- -5-
-6- -7-
-8- -9- -10-
-11- -12- -13-
XPOHOME