Allen & Ginter

Last updated
Allen & Ginter
Company type Private
Industry Tobacco
FoundedCa. 1880
FounderJohn F. Allen, Lewis Ginter
Defunct1890;134 years ago (1890) [1]
FateMerged to other companies to form American Tobacco Co. [2]
Headquarters Richmond, Virginia,
USA
Products Cigarettes, Pipe tobacco
Brands
  • Dandies
  • Little Beauties
  • Perfection
  • Richmond Gems
  • Virginia Brights

Allen & Ginter was a Richmond, Virginia, tobacco manufacturing company formed by John F. Allen and Lewis Ginter around 1880. The firm created and marketed the first cigarette cards for collecting and trading in the United States. Some of the notable cards in the series include baseball players Charles Comiskey, Cap Anson, and Jack Glasscock, as well as non-athletes like Buffalo Bill Cody.

Contents

The company merged with four other tobacco manufacturers to form the American Tobacco Company in 1890. [1] [2] Since 2006, a revived version of the brand has been issued by Topps for a line of baseball cards. [3]

History

Tobacco manufacturing

Engraving of the Allen & Ginter warehouses in Richmond, Virginia, from an 1886 promotional book Industries of Richmond 1886 - Allen and Ginter.jpg
Engraving of the Allen & Ginter warehouses in Richmond, Virginia, from an 1886 promotional book
Virginia Brights cigarette box by Allen & Ginter, c. 1888 Virginia brights cigarette box.jpg
Virginia Brights cigarette box by Allen & Ginter, c. 1888

The firm of Allen & Ginter, born around 1880, was the rebranding of John F. Allen & Company, a partnership formed about eight years earlier by John F. Allen and Lewis Ginter. When Allen retired in 1882, Ginter took on John Pope as his new partner but kept Allen's name. The first tobacco company to employ female labor, by 1886 they had 1,100 employees, predominantly girls, who rolled the cigarettes. [4]

Around 1876, the company offered a prize for the invention of a machine able to roll cigarettes (which until then had been hand-rolled). [5] In 1880, James Albert Bonsack of Virginia invented a cigarette rolling machine. Because it was not completely reliable, all but one of the large tobacco manufacturers declined to buy the machine. James Buchanan Duke did buy this cigarette rolling machine in 1885 and used it to great success; by 1890 he had consolidated his four major competitors, including Allen & Ginter, and formed the American Tobacco Company. [6] The "Allen & Ginter Company" was no more, but Lewis Ginter sat on the board of the American Tobacco Company.

The cigarette brands of Allen & Ginter included Richmond Gems, Virginia Brights, Perfection, Dandies and Little Beauties.

In 1890, Allen & Ginter, along with other companies of the United States (W. Duke & Sons, W.S. Kimball & Company, Kinney Tobacco, and Goodwin & Company) formed the American Tobacco Company, in an attempt to compete against British tobacco companies. [1]

Collectible cards

In late 1880s, Allen & Ginter began to release cigarette card sets as promotional items for its cigarette brands. The most part of the collection consisted of illustrated cards, but there were a few collections of photographs. Topics varied from birds and wild animals to American Indian chiefs or flags of the world. Allen & Ginter's baseball cards were the first of the tobacco era baseball cards ever produced for distribution on a national level. [7] The most popular and highly sought after of these sets is the N28 and N29 "World's Champions" series, released in 1887. [3]

Modern era

Allen & Ginter (brand)
Allen Ginter brand logo.png
Product type Trading cards
Owner Topps
Country United States
Introduced2006;18 years ago (2006)
Related brands Topps
Website Allen & Ginter collection

In 2006, Topps, a leading producer of confectionery and trading cards, resurrected the Allen & Ginter brand name to produce a series of illustrated trading cards, mostly focused on baseball sets. Nevertheless, the first couple of years of the product's inception saw the inclusion of several other sports figures such as Jennie Finch (softball), Brandi Chastain and Mia Hamm (soccer), Hulk Hogan (wrestling), Danica Patrick (auto racing), Leon Spinks (boxing), Randy Couture (mixed martial arts), Misty May-Treanor (beach volleyball) and Dennis Rodman (basketball). [3]

Allen & Ginter cards began to feature hand-painted cards of current baseball players as well as various insert sets featuring standout athletes in other sports, pop culture icons, and historical figures ranging from Wee-Man to Davy Crockett and everything in between.

Non-sports trading cards issued by Topps included personalities such as Robert E. Lee, Thomas Edison, Billy the Kid and Andrew Carnegie, Davy Crockett, among others. [3]

From 2006 to 2009, artist Dick Perez was commissioned to hand paint special one of one insert cards in the style of Allen & Ginter. Perez created 30 art cards each of those years featuring the prominent stars of the game. [8]

As of 2012 the Allen & Ginter series remains one of Topps' most popular, highest selling brands in their product lineup.

The best known of the Allen & Ginter insert sets however, are the DNA Hair Relic cards. These highly lauded cards feature strands of hair from famous historical figures such as Abraham Lincoln, King George III, George Washington and many others. [9]

Another popular feature of the Allen & Ginter product is the Rip Card. Invented by hobby shop owner and Topps consultant Alan Narz, [10] Rip Cards have been a part of every Allen & Ginter product since 2006. These cards allow collectors to keep the card intact or to rip the outer card to reveal an exclusive mini card available only inside of a Rip Card. These mini cards may be short prints, autographs, or cards made from metal or wood. Beginning in 2013, Topps began including a Double Rip Card, which had two inner cavities with mini cards inside. In 2019, Topps introduced a jumbo Box Topper Rip Card, with 3 mini cards inside.

Trading cards series

There were various cigarette card sets released as promotional items for these products. The most popular and highly sought after of these sets is the N28 and N29 "World's Champions" series, released in 1887. [3]

Some of the series released were (all illustrations, except where noted):

Notes
  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Photographic cards.
  2. For Our Litte Beauties cigarettes.
  3. For Virginia Brights cigarettes.
  4. For Richmond cigarettes.
Cigarette cards gallery

Further reading

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cigarette card</span> Trading cards included in cigarette packaging

Cigarette cards are trading cards issued by tobacco manufacturers to stiffen cigarette packaging and advertise cigarette brands.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Trading card</span> Picture cards that are collectable

A trading card is a small card, usually made out of paperboard or thick paper, which usually contains an image of a certain person, place or thing and a short description of the picture, along with other text. There is a wide variation of different types of cards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Baseball card</span> Type of trading card related to baseball

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">American Tobacco Company</span> American firm (1890–1994)

The American Tobacco Company was a tobacco company founded in 1890 by J. B. Duke through a merger between a number of U.S. tobacco manufacturers including Allen and Ginter and Goodwin & Company. The company was one of the original 12 members of the Dow Jones Industrial Average in 1896. The American Tobacco Company dominated the industry by acquiring the Lucky Strike Company and over 200 other rival firms. Federal Antitrust action begun in 1907 broke the company into several major companies in 1911.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Topps</span> American company

The Topps Company, Inc. is an American company that manufactures trading cards and other collectibles. Formerly based in New York City, Topps is best known as a leading producer of baseball and other sports and non-sports themed trading cards. Topps also produces cards under the brand names Allen & Ginter and Bowman.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lewis Ginter</span> American businessman and philanthropist (1824–1897)

Lewis Ginter was a prominent businessman, financier, military officer, real estate developer, and philanthropist centered in Richmond, Virginia. A native of New York City, Ginter accumulated a considerable fortune throughout his numerous business ventures and became one of Richmond's wealthiest citizens despite his exceptionally modest demeanor. While the Jefferson Hotel and Ginter Park embody some of Ginter's major urban contributions to Richmond, many of his philanthropic gifts were given anonymously to charitable organizations and individuals in need. Ginter served in the Confederacy, attaining the rank of major and played a major role in bringing Richmond back from the ravages of the Civil War. His continued devotion to the city is captured in his famous remark, "I am for Richmond, first and last."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Henry Slocum (tennis)</span> American tennis player

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">T206</span>

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">American football card</span>

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Basketball card</span>

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Prizes are promotional items—small toys, games, trading cards, collectables, and other small items of nominal value—found in packages of brand-name retail products that are included in the price of the product with the intent to boost sales, similar to toys in kid's meals. Collectable prizes produced in series are used extensively—as a loyalty marketing program—in food, drink, and other retail products to increase sales through repeat purchases from collectors. Prizes have been distributed through bread, candy, cereal, cheese, chips, crackers, laundry detergent, margarine, popcorn, and soft drinks. The types of prizes have included comics, fortunes, jokes, key rings, magic tricks, models, pin-back buttons, plastic mini-spoons, puzzles, riddles, stickers, temporary tattoos, tazos, trade cards, trading cards, and small toys. Prizes are sometimes referred to as "in-pack" premiums, although historically the word "premium" has been used to denote an item that is not packaged with the product and requires a proof of purchase and/or a small additional payment to cover shipping and/or handling charges.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">T200 Fatima</span>

T200, also known as Fatima Team Cards, were a type of cigarette card issued in 1913 by the Liggett & Myers Tobacco Company (L&M) through the Fatima cigarette brand. The set featured photos of professional baseball teams. The 'T200' designation comes from the American Card Catalogue, an authoritative guide to trading cards issued prior to 1951.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Australian rules football card</span>

An Australian rules football card is a type of trading card relating to Australian rules football, usually printed on cardboard, silk, or plastic. These cards feature one or more Australian rules football players. Cards are almost exclusively found in Australia as no top-level leagues are present outside the country. Prices for Australian rules football cards can be very high. This is illustrated for both vintage and modern cards such as an 1894 American Tobacco Company card featuring Essendon player Will Crebbin which sold for $10,110 in 2018 and a 2004 Select AFL Conquest Triple Brownlow Medallist signature card featuring Nathan Buckley, Adam Goodes and Mark Ricciuto which was valued at $3,000 in 2018.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Association football card</span>

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References

  1. 1 2 3 Porter, Patrick G. (1969). "Origins of the American Tobacco Company". Business History Review. 43 (1) (1 ed.). President and Fellows of Harvard College: 59–76. doi:10.2307/3111987. JSTOR   3111987. S2CID   145351728 . Retrieved 16 November 2015.
  2. 1 2 A Trust to Bust: American Tobacco Company Organized, 1890 on the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources, 31 Jan 2016
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 1887 N28 Allen & Ginter Baseball Cards on The Cardboard Connection
  4. The industries of Richmond : Her Trade, Commerce, Manufactures and Representative Establishments. Richmond: Metropolitan Publishing Co., 1886.
  5. Burns, Brian. Lewis Ginter: Richmond's Gilded Age Icon. Charleston, SC: History Press, 2011.
  6. Pritcher, Lynn. "More About Tobacco Advertising and the Tobacco Collections." Duke University Libraries. 24 January 2008. 10 April 2008.
  7. Allen & Ginter Tobacco Cards (Archive, 27 Jul 2009)
  8. "2006 Allen & Ginter Dick Perez Original Sketches". sportscard-checklists.net. Archived from the original on 2013-02-22.
  9. "2010 Topps Allen and Ginter DNA Hair Relic Set Checklist". Archived from the original on 2012-07-21. Retrieved 2012-05-15.
  10. "Collectible card with cavity for containing inner item".