Lone Sole: c1955 Sumo Wrestling Playing Card

As a set completionist, I dislike having single, uncatalogued cards/menko in my collection.  It pains me to see these lone cards without any other companion cards because it prevents me from cataloguing them in my book.  This lone sole of Yokozuna Chiyonoyama has sat in the lone sole section in my to-be-catalogued binder for many years now...probably on the order of a decade or more.  By all accounts, it is a rather ordinary menko/playing card.  The edges are smooth indicating it was likely issued in packs or in a magazine as a give away.  On the back there appears small glue spots which indicate it could have been used as a prize card for a menko set, or it was stuck in a album.  It is off-centered which is not uncommon for menko/cards of this era and could elude to it being more of a give away in children's magazine.  Chiyonoyama was ranked as Yokozuna from 1952-1958 and was the stablemaster for the great Chiyonofuji so he definitely is no slouch.

I hope everyone had a great weekend and have an amazing week!

New Sumo Wrestling Set / 1937 Rikishi Left Box 5 (R3711)

I was able to finally remove one of my lone sole cards and match it to this new set that I picked up.  This is the 1937 Rikishi Left Box 5 set (Catalog # R3711).  It has one of Yokozuna Minanogawa's first Yokozuna menko in it and Shinkai's last menko as well.  It also contains a rare gyoji card.  Each menko measure about 1.0" x 2.25" and has some pretty cool gold gilding on the front.  Unfortunately some ambitious kid wrote on the back of them, but it definitely gives them character.

1930s Japanese Sumo Menko Lone Soles

Unfortunately, my Lone Sole pile is slowly accumulating more cards than are being matched.  This pile has lone examples of particular sets that I try and hook up a sole-mate to so I can catalogue them in my book.  These past few months, 4 more have entered.....hopefully destined to leave before I do.

First up we have an early 1930s halftone M-series menko of Shinkai.  I would hope I can stumble across more of these as they have a very distinctive back.

 Next is a beautiful gold-gilded drawing of Kagamiiwa in the M-series from the early 1930s.  Another distinctive back.

 I haven't been able to translate this back, but looks like a kimarite finishing move on the front and the style is from the early 1930s as well.

 Lastly, an R-series of Taroyama from the mid 1930s.

Lone Sole Mate / New M-Series Set: M548 - 1954 Famous Stars 10

    Two Lone Sole Mates in a month!  Hopefully I keep this up.  This set has eluded me forever.....and the evidence was right under my nose the whole time.  I've owned maybe 4-5 of the sumo card of Yokozuna Yoshibayama over the years, but could never find another sumo wrestling menko card in the set.....that's because he is the only sumo wrestling star in the set and the other cards are famous stars from baseball, tv, movies, and cartoons.  I have a big box of misc menko cards that I've accumulated over the years as I tend to "dump" the non-sumo cards in this box when I buy auction lots.  It's been slowly piling up and I've made a concerted effort recently to try and put some of the cards on eBay to thin the herd and give these menko new homes.  I found a baseball menko of Fumio Fujimura that I listed on eBay with no takers....fortunately.  When I studied the back design of the Fujimura menko I realized I had seen that back before and went to my binder of Lone Sole sumo menko.  Low and behold I discovered a match...I then proceeded to dig through the box of misc menko and discovered 4 more bringing the total that I have of this set to 6.
   I've labeled this set the M548 - 1954 Famous Stars 10 set with the checklist as follows:

- 9989354617 - Boy on Bear (Unknown)
- 8795234157 - Fumio Fujimura (Baseball) 
- 7824357681 - Keiko Kishi (Actress)
- 6732548295 - Yokozuna Yoshibayama (Sumo)
- 2545678951 - Keiji Sada (Actor)
- 1698675432 - Tarzan (Actor)

Good stuff....now I can go have a beer and enjoy the rest of my Labor Day weekend feeling like I've accomplished something laborious.  Enjoy and stay safe this weekend.....talk to you next week!

Lone Sole Mate / New M-Series Set: M526 - 1952 Trump 5

I have a binder of "To-be-checklisted" sumo menko sets.  These are sets I have just acquired and that I have not yet entered nor checklisted in my book.  Normally the amount of sets in my binder number between 5-10... I'm always cataloging and clearing new sets as new ones come in.  I define a set as having two or more menko, however, I also have a section in my binder called the Lone Soles.  These are menko I only have one of and can't catalogue them since I usually need at least two menko to narrow down a year.  Some of these Lone Soles have been in there for years....in some instances almost 10.  This week I was able to move one of my menko out of the Lone Sole section and into the queue for cataloguing due to finding another one from the set.  Nothing brings me more joy, other than discovering new sets, than finding a match (or Sole Mate if you will) to my Lone Sole pile.  Sumo menko collecting will never be as mainstream as baseball or football, but in this small niche collecting community, these are the discoveries that get us excited.

This Lone Sole Mate is a a new M-Series set from 1952 and I've catalogued it as the M526 - 1952 Trump 5.  I had the #53819 Yokozuna Chiyonoyama menko for what seemed like an eternity, but I picked up the #62357 Yokozuna Terukuni menko recently at auction.  I've deduced it's from 1952 as Terukuni retired early on in 1953 and Chiyonoyama didn't promote to Yokozuna until later in 1951.  This set has the possibility of being from 1951 or 1950, but I'll update it if I happen to find any more of these rare bad boys.  I love the artwork on this set and the colors are nice and vivid.....also having a red-inked back is quite rare too as most sets usually have blue, brown, black, purple, or green.  Red is really uncommon.

I am hoping that more of these exist out there, but given that I have only found 2 in my 16 years or so of collecting, I am unlikely to find many more.  If a Wakanohana menko of this set exists, that would be the big menko of this set as it would be considered his Debut Menko.....much like a rookie card is defined.