Moguls, Highlanders and Merry Andrews

If you have seen a few older sets of playing cards, you may well have come across some odd names that are used on the wrappers and boxes: ‘Moguls’, ‘Harrys’, ‘Highlanders’ and ‘Merry Andrews’ were names used in England from the 1700s (and possibly earlier) until the early 1900s. In the USA these were adopted by the early makers, who also added their own American descriptions: ‘Eagle’ and later ‘Steamboats’.

By the late 1800s in England, these names were used to show card quality: Moguls or Great Moguls were the highest quality that the maker could offer, then Harrys (actually a nickname - these started as Henry VIII), Highlanders and Merry Andrews. In the United States, the Eagle took top place, as Englishness was highly unfashionable in the decades after independence. Steamboats have typically been a cheaper offering.

“How did this really strange naming get started?” is a good question, and it has an ancient answer: as we will discover, this relates to the historic regulation of playing card making in London.

In 1628 the Worshipful Company of Makers of Playing Cards was created by a Charter from King Charles I. French makers (those in Rouen in particular) had a lot more experience than the makers in London, who therefore struggled to compete against imported cards in terms of both quality and price (don’t quote me on this it would not sound good in London).

A deal was struck whereby the King would agree legislation banning imported cards and in return there would be a new tax on playing cards that the playing card makers agreed to collect.

Because of the taxation responsibilities, the Worshipful Company had to administer card production closely. Each maker was asked to register one or more distinctive names and markings for use on their card wrappers - effectively an early kind of trademark. This is how The Great Mogul, Henry VIII, the Valiant Highlander, Merry Andrew and many many other characters began their lives.

In London, in most eras there has been one maker who was notably more successful than the others. In the 1700s the leading maker was Philip Blanchard, followed by his son Christopher. The principal sign used by Christopher Blanchard was the Great Mogul shown above.

While the term ‘marketing’ would have meant little to these makers, the idea that a special sign added value was certainly understood and by 1743 Thomas Hill was also making cards carrying the sign of the Great Mogul.

As noted, Blanchard was the most popular of the contemporary makers, so his sign was the obvious one to copy.

Blanchard took his case to Court. Blanchard v Hill 1743 was heard by Lord Hardwicke and astonishingly by modern standards, the ruling went in Hill’s favor. While the idea of a brand was known (from its original use, branding with fire) this had yet to be enshrined in law.

The result undermined the WCMPC, because it established that the system of makers’ marks that is ruled over was effectively worthless.

The most popular of the makers’ signs saw widespread adoption and evolved to show higher and lower levels of quality and price. We show examples above by Gibson & Gisborne and by Hunt – both of whom were legitimate successors to Christopher Blanchard, having bought the business after his death in 1769.

During the 1800s through to the 1860s, playing cards were making a transition from gambling clubs (including the less official ones) to social and family games. In recognition of this, in 1868 the English tax on playing cards was reduced from a shilling (12 old pennies) to 3d (three old pennies). Makers absolutely thrived (production went up three to fourfold) and soon there were a wide variety of qualities to suit every level of this new market.

As we see in the images above, more than 100 years after the Blanchard versus Hill case, the Great Mogul was widely used as an advertising device on wrappers. Incidentally, Biermans (maker of the wrapper on the right above) was lone of several Belgian playing card makers that joined to create Carta Mundi (now Cartamundi).

In the USA, the more successful of the early makers were well aware of these various standard names, and in Hochman (page 11, see references) we read that Amos Whitney (1795-1804) used Merry Andrew and Harry the Eighth (among other names).

Crehore and the Ford family also used these names and one of them probably introduced a new ‘Eagle’ designation as the highest quality – this being a natural addition given the eagle added to the ‘American Manufacture’ ace.

The English makers added two US-related names – Club House (originally from Hart?) and Anglo-American. Both can be seen in Willis list, if your eyesight is perfect!