I was looking at baseball card site today, and I came across this interesting piece on how the Topps Baseball Card company put out a series of Civil War News cards for the Centennial back in 1962. The set was designed in 1961 and began selling in 1962. There are 88 cards in the set. Each card has a full-color painting on the front and a “news report” of the depicted action on the back. I looked on ebay and saw a lot of these cards for sale. Over the summer I will try to find images of all of the cards and post them in order. I am interested in how the Civil War and Reconstruction were recalled in popular culture, and this is a set I was really not familiar with.
The cards were horizontal on the front and vertical on the back, supposed to look like a news report. The first card depicts John Brown’s raid. Interestingly, the first two people you see in the picture, apart from Brown, are an African American man and woman.
The second card depicts Jefferson Davis’s inauguration in Montgomery, Alabama in 1861 in front of a Confederate Battle Flag, which did not yet exist!
Next up is a depiction of the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter from the point of view of the United States troops defending the fortification.
The fourth card depicts the First Battle of Bull Run in July, 1861.
This is the last of the cards setting up the opening moves of the war. I will post other cards in coming weeks. Did you collect these cards? Have you seen them before?
Here is the list of the complete set:
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Just like Walt Disney films, (‘Rob Roy’, ‘Davy Crockett’, etc), these weren’t ‘painstaking’ accurate depictions of history down to the micro details.
They were meant to capture attention, stir interest, and plant the seeds of loving history.
The bloody battle “bubble gum cards” depictions were definitely marketed towards young boys.
To Admin: This webpage is one of the very best about the war. Please keep up the fantastic work!
Thanks. I have been writing about the Civil War and Reconstruction for a dozen years now. As long as I still get 100,000 or so readers each year for my two blogs on it I will keep publishing, God willing.
Keep up the great work!
Oh my God they are the cards that I was referring to!, memories of getting them are now flooding back to of how graphic & bloody they was, the picture of “Jeff davis” standing on that balcony has just knocked off 60yrs of my life!, the colours were fantastic!, great to see them pics again, many,many, thanks.
I have the entire set!!! I collected them in Grade 4
I have an unmarked checklist as well as original sConfederate $$$)!
What memories they evoke!!!
I heard that TOPPS pulled them off of the US market, due to mothers being upset by the graphic depiction of violence in the artwork. Do you remember when, or later learn when they stopped selling them?