About Silk Cigarette Cards

SELLING A COLLECTION OF OVER 2500 SILK AND FELT CIGARETTE AND CIGAR CARDS ALL VINTAGE PRE 1933 AND ALL IN VERY GOOD CONDITION

My name is Arthur and I have been collecting these fine rare items of tobacciana with my fore fathers for 90 years now,my father passed away 10 years ago and now I wish to sell on these wonderful examples of fine rare material cigarette and silk cards to encourage others to collect.
My late father's father was a cigarette maker in Greece between 1890-1903, originally born in Salonika and then at the age of 25 went with the family to London by ship ,arrived at London docks and went to live in Shoreditch as a refugee within the city boundary.
Given a 2 bed apartment for a small amount of money in that area, it was the first UK tenement buildings.

He then needed to start to look for work as a cigarette maker and found a manufacturer in central London called Carreras see Wikipedia Carreras
Jose Carrera was the boss and interviewed all job applicants, my grandfather was next,well this was a great opportunity for my grandfather as Jose only spoke Spanish and my grandfather spoke (Ladino) Spanish and English, because Jose had all English speaking staff was unable to communicate, he was so happy to have my grandfather and he became manger of the workforce in hand made cigarettes.Unfortunately it didn't last more than a few years as machines arrived and the WW1 was about to start and most unpleasant was my grandfather went deaf and dumb,that was the end of his cigarette making,he then went on to repairing Oriental carpets and rugs with one of his 9 brothers in South Kensington Underground Station London called The Anglo Persian Carpet Co still there but now a chemist.That job did not last long either WW2 had began and my grand father went blind due to diabetes(unknown at the time)this was due to inbred families his parents were 1st cousins and his wife was a 1st cousin and to this day we still have type 1 diabetes in the family taking one member every generation to die early, that's how it was in the old days ,but with all the problems he collected about 100 silk cigarette cards that were made by Carreras in 1932 called Kensitas Cigarettes Silk Flowers my father carried on collecting, some are available in my shop.
Please take a look at the items that have been collected by 3 generations and feel free to ask any questions.

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