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Electrical Mah Jong

Published December 04, 2015 Updated May 09, 2023

Electrical Mah Jong was produced by De La Rue for The Western Electric Company Ltd in 1924 for the Wembley Exhibition.

1924 United Kingdom De la Rue Engineering Telecommunications Card Games Mahjong

De la Rue & Co Ltd already produced conventional Mah-Jongg sets with bone and bamboo tiles, but this ‘Electrical Mah Jong’ card game was produced for The Western Electric Company Ltd in 1924 for the Wembley Exhibition, at which they had a stand, showing old radios, cables and telephones of the period from 1875 to 1924. At that time the Western Electric Company was a major player in the advancement of International Communications, producing over half the world’s telephones and a wide range of components, cables, wireless and receiving apparatus, some of which are illustrated on the cards below  more →

See: the boxthe score card.

Suits symbols are Phones (P), Radio Valves (R) and Cables (C). Winds are East, South, West, and North. Dragon Cards are Arial (Red), Earth (Green), and Ether (White). Red Honour Cards are Periods - 1875, 1898, 1918, and 1924. Green Honour Cards are Symbols - Western Electric Company Limited London, WEC, Quality First Cables and Telephones, and Western Electric Modern Domestic.

Cards from ‘Electrical Mah Jong’ produced by De La Rue for The Western Electric Company Ltd in 1924

Above: cards from ‘Electrical Mah Jong’ produced by De La Rue for The Western Electric Company Ltd in 1924. 148 gold edged cards plus 4 scoring cards.

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By Rex Pitts (1940-2021)

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.


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