I like these multi-purpose sets that were issued in the 1950s. This particular one has a manga story on the front along with the hiragana alphabet for playing
karuta, and sumo wrestlers on the back. A lot of times these came in kids magazines which inevitably leads to crooked edges from unskilled scissor use, paper loss, and general disarray.....all of which I love. These cards actually were held in a Japanese child's hand 60 years ago. History right here. I'm not up on my 1950s Japanese manga series which might help determine which magazine these came in, but fortunately the sumo wrestlers have rank information which can help us narrow down an exact year....1958 in this case since Shinobuyama only held the Sekiwake rank for three tournaments in the latter half of 1958. The cards measure 1.75" x 2.5"...approximately.
These are the only 6 cards from this set I have seen in all my years of collecting...and until I find out if they were actually issued in a magazine, I'll catalogue them under the karuta (K-series) column...this one being the K581 set. Here is the current checklist:
い - Yokozuna Wakanohana
ろ - Yokozuna Tochinishiki
へ - Yokozuna Chiyonoyama
ほ - Ozeki Asashio
ぬ - Ozeki Kotogahama
り - Sekiwake Shinobuyama
Very cool and a little odd. I pretty much appreciate any vintage trading card, but if you told me that there were cards out there featuring manga on one side and sumo wrestlers on the back, I don't think I'd believe you. Gotta admit for being 60 years old, these are very colorful cards.
ReplyDeleteIt’s interesting that there are numerous examples of dual topic cards. Sumo and baseball seems pretty common.
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