Does anyone on here know about old cigarette cards?

Jesse Dart

East Fremantle Football Club for life
Messages
765
Location
East Fremantle, WA
Real Name
Jesse
eBay User
jessedartno9
COMC User
GoWizards
Hey guys,

Was at a local antique store recently when I found a 1928-29 Cigarette card for Australian Test Cricketer Bill Ponsford. Does anyone have an idea of what this could be worth?
 
I think so @Nazim, any ideas on value?

Jesse I'm no expert on pricing, but if it's the Wills one, they aren't worth more than a few dollars.

For reasons I cannot explain, a lot of cigarette card sets, particularly those from John Player & Sons and Wills do not seem to be worth a lot. Someone else may have a more informed opinion than I though :)
 
Wills cricket generally not worth a lot but some are quite rare, Wills released millions of cig cards in Australia/NZ.
London Cigarette card catalogue best reference source. Murray cigarette guide good as well, though now out of print.
 
I've just found my old Dion H Skinner book on ciggie cards from way back in 1983. Cards then were $2.00 in Excellent cond.
Ponsford is listed as #36 or #33 in the series, though they are unnumbered. There were 48 cards in the 1928/9 set by Wills.
 
Jesse, as suggested earlier Will's produced a huge amount of cigarette cards between WW1 and WW2, which are in the majority of cases very common and would already be in most pre WW2 Cricket Card collections.

The Cricket cards they produced pre WW1 are much harder to find in GC and command bigger prices - for the rare 1901/02 issues - up to $200 for a VG - Ex card.

The Bill Ponsford card you have comes from the series labelled 1928/29 Cricket Season and consists of 48 cards, with 40 of them including Don Bradman, who is usually the premium card in any set (but not this one), relatively easy to collect. Trade Fairs, eBay, Auctions etc. regularly throw up the 'common' 40 cards and they shouldn't cost more than $5 - 10 each.

The other eight are much harder to find and nobody seems to know why, though general speculation suggests that they weren't printed at the same time as the original print run and hence there are less of them. We'll probably never know, but if you ever get a chance to get hold of a'Beckett (two variations), Andrews, Bettington, Hooker, Ironmonger, Kelleway, Nothling or Scott, grab them though these can trade for up to $200 each!

There is also some thought that an even rarer issue of them without the reverse printing exists - I've seen the rare eight cards all in this variety and these might bring more than $200 each in the right market

Good luck collecting
 
Back
Top Bottom