a few trade cards, Friday June 29th 2012

A little about trade cards.

Trade card describes small cards, similar to the visiting cards exchanged in social circles, that businesses would distribute to clients and potential customers. Trade cards first became popular at the beginning of the 17th century in London. These functioned asadvertising and also as maps, directing the public to merchants' stores, as no formal street address numbering system existed at the time.

The trade card is an early example of the modern business card. Some businesses began to create increasingly sophisticated designs, especially with the development of color printing. A few companies specialized in producing stock cards, usually with an image on one side and space on the other side for the business to add its own information. As the designs became more attractive and colorful, collecting trade cards became a popular hobby in the late 19th century, since color images were not yet widely available.

In its original sense, the "trade" in trade card refers to its use by the proprietor of a business to announce his trade, or line of business. By moving into the realm of collecting, trade cards gave rise to the trading card, the meaning now shifting to the exchange or trade of cards by enthusiasts. Some cards, particularly those produced by tobacco companies featuring baseball players, later developed into collectibles and lost their function as a business advertisement.

Love these Dr. Who Adventure Cards of yore, found on the Del Campe website.
In 1967, Dr. Who Adventure, a 36 card comic strip story, was released by T. Wall & Sons.
T. Wall & Sons' Sky Ray ice lollies were sold with a collectible card inside each wrapper. There was also an album entitled Dr Who's Space Adventure Book to go with the cards.

This last image taken from the great District of Who site, which has the collection of cards.

Retro future version of hunting:

Wednesday afternoon at the end of June 2012

"Above all, be the heroine of your life, not the victim."
RIP Nora Ephron. Her life celebrated on MetaFilter.

Photo Credit: Joseph Marzullo/Wenn.com

That great first scene in the car.



Woman annoys sleeping piglets and makes their ears move to the sound of her voice

Interesting the small differences in life. Here a small difference in step height that causes lots of tripping.



Omg, what is happening in the USA with these monster TSA agents abusing innocent people?! It's nuts. As a traveler - and just as a human - this is so disturbing. A TSA agent laughs after spilling the cremains of a man's father on the airport floor. What a disgusting outrage. The TSA agent must be a sociopath.


An oldie but goodie. Old and new mashup. Could watch this forever.


Uh oh. Sea-level rise accelerates faster on US east coast

Augite is an igneous mineral.



When it is transparent, it often contains pieces of tree. In India this type of Augite is called "shazar" stone or "shajar". Sazar in Arabic means tree. Jewelry is made out of it.

A year later