deck-21-11


	Two trades with a Dutch fellow collector and the SN collection got a bit closer to completion. First there was a deck, that had been on our wish list ever since we had started collecting the works of the Speelkaartenfabriek Nederland in 1996. That collection is not complete yet, but with this deck at least the non-standard decks by SN have been completed. But it wasn't the only thing by SN that I acquired. However, that should be described as Item of the Month. To see, click HERE.

The deck was published as an advertising deck for Heineken in 1940. It was printed by the Speelkaartenfabriek Nederland from Amsterdam in an edition of 12.600 copies, of which 4.680 as a 52 cards deck and 7.920 as a 32 cards deck. I noticed that on the speelkaartenmuseum.nl site there's no mention of a joker. I will change that information there in the coming week.
I also noticed that the shown courts there are the exact same courts as in this deck, same creases, same soiling. If I remember well I made those scans when Eddie Schuiling brought some decks along to scan for a previous SN exposition. Eddie had the largest SN collection in the Netherlands, sadly he died several years ago. His deck, without the joker, was sold in commission by Jean Darquenne to the Dutch collector, from whom I acquired it in a trade. In the meantime this collector had bought the joker on the Dutch auction site, when other court cards were sold separately from an incomplete deck by the same seller. Well, so far about the provenance.

The deck is super rare to find. Just like the "Harte Troef" by SN, but that was published in 1923 in an edition of only 711 decks. This edition was much larger. A possible reason for that could be that it was published in 1940, in which year the Netherlands was drawn into WW II and occupied by the Germans until 1945. Especially the last years of the war were harsh and many paper stuff found its way into the fire to keep the family warm.

The non-standard designs were done by Albert Hahn Jr. which is an alias for the Dutch illustrator Albert Pieter Dijkman (1894-1953). He had already designed the "Smit" deck for SN in 1933. But in that deck all the courts had a different design. Personally I appreciate that and there's a mild dislike of decks with a repeated design on the courts, however nice they may be. But this illustrator has a distinct style, which I appreciate very much. And I hope you do too.

All the courts and aces show the same advertising slogan, which translates as "with Heineken there, it goes better".

The deck consists of 52 cards and a standard factory joker.

It didn't come in the original box.