Round the World Families

Published July 20, 2020 • Updated July 20, 2020

Round the World Families published by the London Missionary Society, c.1945.

Round the World Families published by the London Missionary Society, c.1945. The game has 48 cards with 12 sets of four cards representing places around the world where the Society’s missionaries have carried out missions among the local population. Each of the families of four has a picture of local people and how they were being helped and a picture of one of the missionaries from past or present who had been connected to the place illustrated. The game is played like ‘Happy Families’. See the Rules►

Here is a list of those missionaries and the title of the place depicted: Calcutta, Hannah Mullens (1826–1861) • Erode, R A Hickling (1868–1936) • Gilbert Islands, W E Coward dates unknown • Hankow, Griffith John (1831–1912) • Mbereshi, David Livingstone (1813–1873) • Papua, James Chalmers (1841–1901) • Samoa, John Williams (1796–1839) • Serowe, Khama (1837?–1923) • Shanghai, Dr Lockhart (1811–1896) • Tananarne, David Jones (1796–1841) • Tiger Kloof, Dr Willoughby (1857–1938) • Travancore, Ringeltaub (!770 - ?).

Above: Round the World Families published by the London Missionary Society, c.1945.

The Society was founded in 1795 and became involved around the world prioritising education, especially for girls, school and church building and installation of printing presses to be able to print the bible on site. As an example look at Erode (India), the no 1 card illustrates the famous so called “Brough Church”, built in 1927-1936 by Rev Anthony Watson Brough and named after him. He was a prolific builder who built 94 schools and 20 churches for the mission.

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By Rex Pitts (1940-2021)

United Kingdom • Member since January 30, 2009

Rex's main interest was in card games, because, he said, they were cheap and easy to get hold of in his early days of collecting. He is well known for his extensive knowledge of Pepys games and his book is on the bookshelves of many. His other interest was non-standard playing cards. He also had collections of sheet music, music CDs, models of London buses, London Transport timetables and maps and other objects that intrigued him.

Rex had a chequered career at school. He was expelled twice, on one occasion for smoking! Despite this he trained as a radio engineer and worked for the BBC in the World Service. Later he moved into sales and worked for a firm that made all kinds of packaging, a job he enjoyed until his retirement. He became an expert on boxes and would always investigate those that held his cards. He could always recognize a box made for Pepys, which were the same as those of Alf Cooke’s Universal Playing Card Company, who printed the card games. This interest changed into an ability to make and mend boxes, which he did with great dexterity. He loved this kind of handicraft work.

His dexterity of hand and eye soon led to his making card games of his own design. He spent hours and hours carefully cutting them out and colouring them by hand.