Japanese Sumo Wrestling Cards and Menko
Monday, October 1, 2018
1991 NTT Japanese Telephone Card - Yokozuna Chiyonofuji
I mentioned in a previous post that NTT switched to the barcode backs on their telephone cards in 1991. Before 1991, each back had a unique numbered back for easy cataloguing. After 1991, they went to a generic back with a standard barcode number making cataloguing that much more difficult. Here is one of the first barcode backs (The dreaded 955595 100160 <110-016> number)....which happens to be the great Yokozuna Chiyonofuji. He was called the "Wolf" because of his cunning in the ring and his superb physique was popular among the fans. Chiyonofuji is regarded by some as the greatest wrestler in history due to his contributions to the sport on and off the dohyo. My goal is to start cataloguing Japanese sumo telephone cards with earnest in 2019....as Fuji would say "Down the Rabbit Hole."
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Very cool telephone card. Beautiful photograph. Well cropped. Best of luck on your venture down the rabbit hole.
ReplyDeleteThis is definitely one of the better looking ones for sure! Thanks, I might need some therapy when I am done chasing these down.
DeleteThat is a nice one. I've often seen telephone cards for sale and am aware of the collecting hobby associated with them, but have never gotten into them myself. That whole bar code thing making collecting more difficult must be unique to that hobby!
ReplyDeleteThis will be interesting to try and catalogue all these...not an easy task and probably why no one has tackled it in the past.
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