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Death Cigarettes

Published March 11, 2023 Updated March 14, 2023

‘Death Cigarettes’ anti-smoking playing cards, USA, 1985.

1985 USA Weedon Enterprises Health Tobacco

This pack of anti-smoking cards which gives 52 reasons not to smoke cigarettes was produced by Weedon Enterprises, San Luis Obispo, California in 1985. The same black-and-white cartoons are repeated in each suit, but the hearts and diamonds suits have had splashes of red added to them. Beneath each cartoon is a different reason not to smoke. This pack, together with its sister pack Death on drugs, was part of the series Death playing cards by the same publisher. See the box

Death Cigarettes playing cards produced by Weedon Enterprises, United States, 1985 Death Cigarettes playing cards produced by Weedon Enterprises, United States, 1985

Above: ‘Death Cigarettes’ playing cards produced by Weedon Enterprises, United States, 1985.

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By Peter Burnett

Member since July 27, 2022

I graduated in Russian and East European Studies from Birmingham University in 1969. It was as an undergraduate in Moscow in 1968 that I stumbled upon my first 3 packs of “unusual” playing cards which fired my curiosity and thence my life-long interest. I began researching and collecting cards in the early 1970s, since when I’ve acquired over 3,330 packs of non-standard cards, mainly from North America, UK and Western Europe, and of course from Russia and the former communist countries.

Russian Playing Cards

Following my retirement from the Bodleian Library in Dec. 2007 I took up a new role as Head of Library Development at the International Network for the Availability of Scientific Publications (INASP) to support library development in low-income countries. This work necessitated regular training visits to many sub-Saharan African countries and also further afield, to Vietnam, Nepal and Bangladesh – all of which provided rich opportunities to further expand my playing card collection.

Since 2019 I’ve been working part-time in the Bodleian Library where I’ve been cataloguing the bequest of the late Donald Welsh, founder of the English Playing Card Society.


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