JANUARY 2026

Apparently it's the Dutch month here. Not only is the Deck of the Month Dutch, but now I've chosen a Dutch joker as well. And...... both are a bit of a mystery.
I found this joker among the vast offer at the collectors meeting in Geel, Belgium, which is held on the first Sunday of February, April, September and November. Today that posed a small problem. I didn't want to browse through Miriam's albums....again, so I had decided to go to Geel and find a suitable joker there for this spot and do the update a little later.

It was my first visit to this meeting and I was impressed by the number of attendants and dealers. I had always assumed that, being a follow-up of the meetings in Hasselt, the offer would be mostly jokers and backs, but there was a good number of decks on offer too. Although the offer didn't show much antique decks, there were interesting vintage and modern decks to be found. My quest was to find a joker, but as I had brought jokers and decks myself too I was more preoccupied with selling than with browsing the other tables. However, this one caught my eye. The joker comes from a Dutch deck, described as G-J and dated as c1944. The name was derived from the design on the box, which shows a shield with a monogram of these letters. The dating was based on the flimsy paper, scarce by the end of WWII here, on which it was printed. So a bit of a mystery deck too. 
The courts had the international pattern, but with one oddity........

a smiling jack.

Almost too late I realized that February is a short month, so the both the Deck of the Month and this Joker of the Month were chosen on the 28th. But, in between going out for groceries around noon and a quick diner at 8, I managed to do the research and write the articles within a day.
As I didn't acquire any decks or jokers this month, both deck and joker had to come from the collection. The Deck of the Month was found in one of the piles of decks on my desk and for the joker I took out Miriam's B/W album.

There was one competitor, by chance also from Germany, but this one won. The joker was a standard joker of Walter Scharff AG, a printing and publishing company, which was active between 1923 and 1931. It was one of the 2 jokers that came in decks with the Berlin pattern. This is an early one, with only two times JOKER printed at the sides. It probably dates from around 1925.
When I looked it up, I recognized the second joker that came with the Berlin patterned decks. It's also a very nice one.
Maybe next month?

A vintage joker, so not February's antique brother. He turned out to be a stepbrother anyway (different back) and I offered him for sale in Tom van Berkum's FB group. Tom himself was the buyer and at this moment the joker is on his way to be handed to him at the collectors meeting in Geel on April 5.
When you're a joker collector and interested to buy, sell or swap jokers Tom's group could become one of your sources. If you're not familiar with his group: Joker Collectors Club - Buy, Sell, Swap | Facebook

Among others I offered some nice American jokers from the 1930's there, of which each was nice enough to earn a spot here. But they were all sold and I didn't find it appropriate to show a joker here, which had left the collection before this update. 
So I took out a random holder ("Sitting Jokers"), browsed through it to see which one would catch my eye first. And this was the one. It looked German to me, but to be sure of it's origin I used a handy tool to search for specific jokers on the WWPCM website. Result: made by the Bielefelder Spielkarten and dated as 1972. It came with standard Berlin patterned decks. So it shouldn't be a difficult joker to find. Still, although masked he's a jolly guy.

This antique joker (Speelkaartenfabriek Nederland, 1912-1915) will almost certainly be sold and leave the collection next month, just like another "little devil" (see November 2011) has left it only a few days ago. It was used in a swap with a Belgian collector to acquire a SN deck. Although it turned out that the "deck" consisted of only the court cards, aces, joker, a rare extra card and the original wrapper, I was happy with the swap. It brought me SN's first English pattern, which we had never been able to find for our SN collection.

I've made a start with compiling a list in Excel of all the different SN decks and items, which will be donated to the Playing Card Museum in Turnhout, Belgium. Before starting I gathered all the SN folders and stray decks in my work space to see if there were any duplicates. I haven't started on the complete decks, but found a folder in which Miriam had gathered SN jokers for their different back designs. For the oldest ones, like this "little devil" and the "little farmer boy" it was easy to determine that they were duplicates. In those days only one joker was added to a deck and if we had had the deck we would have kept it with the courts and aces of that deck.
As I don't see any research reason to include single cards, jokers or backs, in my donation to the museum, these jokers will be for sale soon, starting with this one. A price indication: I very recently sold a similar one with square corners to a Dutch collector for € 200. Still interested? Make me an offer I can't refuse... here.

The jokers of the month from.....