Old West Guns

Published October 15, 2023 Updated October 15, 2023

Old West Guns playing cards containing information about firearms from the Old West, USA.

2018 USAAmericanaEducationFirearmsKickstarter
Old West Guns playing cards created by Gun Channels, USA, 2018

Created via a Kickstarter project in 2018 by Gun Channels, each card in this pack has detailed information about a specific firearm from the Old West. This includes a full colour image, model name, date of manufacture, number produced, calibre, capacity, action, barrel length, inventor, nickname and a life-size image of the ammunition. Each suit is devoted to a particular type of weapon: spades – rifles; hearts – revolvers; clubs – shotguns and rimfire and diamonds – derringers and pocket guns. One joker displays a Gatling Gun while the other shows different sized bullets. A leaflet accompanies the pack acknowledging the gun shops, museums, friends and firearm experts who supported the project. See the leaflet

Old West Guns playing cards created by Gun Channels, USA, 2018 Old West Guns playing cards created by Gun Channels, USA, 2018 Old West Guns playing cards created by Gun Channels, USA, 2018

Above: Old West Guns playing cards created via a Kickstarter project in 2018 by Gun Channels, USA.

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By Peter Burnett

United Kingdom • Member since July 27, 2022 • Contact

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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