Above: 'Belisha' card game, 1938.

Above: Woodland Snap, c.1960.

Above: box from Famous Five card game, 1951.

Pepys Games, c.1936-

Castell Brothers, 5 Bridewell Place, London
Also at: 9-12 Bow Street, London W.C.2 and North Wallace Street, Glasgow C.4.

Castell Brothers was founded in London, in 1878. At first, they offered stationery items, Valentine Cards and Christmas Cards. They called their range of wares ‘Pepys Parchment’. In 1936 the Disney film ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’ was so popular that Castell Brothers decided to make their first game based on the film. They used their old name Pepys to publish this game. In around 1939 Pepys Games took over Kum-Bak Sports titles. Pepys also published standard playing cards which were usually printed by Alf Cooke (Universal Playing Card Co) or De la Rue, sometimes with special Aces of Spades. The illustrators Bruce Angrave and Racey Helps designed games for Castell Bros.

Holidays at Home

A 1944 advertisement read: “Pepys Card Games are a good substitute for the holiday entertainment voluntarily given up this year in the cause of the country. Very restricted supplies only are available...”

The reason for these austerities was that after Norway was invaded the paper shortage, which was already serious, became acute. All paper supplies were strictly licensed for particular purposes and economies were required in every possible way. This extended to playing cards. In addition men under the age of thirty-five had been called up for active service and experienced staff had been redeployed.

Pepys game titles include: Win-a-Lot; Famo; Garden Flowers; Stocks & Shares; Just William; Kargo; Pinocchio; Peter Pan; Dan Dare; I Commit; Crime Club; The Wizard of Oz; Winnie-the-Pooh; Robin Hood; Goal; Panto; International Football; Alice; Speed; Flight; Peter Pan; Dumbo; Belisha; Mickey's Fun Fair; Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs; Pilgrims Progress; Famo; Jack of all Trades; The Planes Game; Farmyard Cries; Legs Eleven; Wu-Pee; Gulliver's Travels; Davy Crockett; British Birds; British Towns; Round Britain; Happy Families of the World; Panda's Party; Film Fantasy; Happy Families of the Nations; Secret Agent; Round Europe; Peter and the Pirates; Guiding; Scouting; Victory; Channel X; Express; Rupert; Peter and the Wolf; Tom & Jerry Snap; Little Grey Rabbit; Find Out; Famous Five; Secret Seven; Woodland Old Maid; Woodland Snap; Rally; Muffin; Vacuation; Girl; Riders of the Range; Mickey and the Beanstalk; Astronaut; Biggles; Car Game; Planes Game; Trains; Cinderella; Shuffled Symphonies; Wild Life; Wild Flower Sevens; Wimbledon; Woody Woodpecker; The Faraway Tree; Family Favourites; Foreign Legion; Fred Basset; The Perishers; Photo Crime; Punch & Judy; Safari; Test Pilot; They're Off

In 1983, the business was sold to Gibsons who still make a few of the more popular titles today.

If you have any original Pepys Games and would like to send us images, hi-res scans will be acknowledged and added to this section.