Old West Guns
Old West Guns playing cards containing information about firearms from the Old West, USA.
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►
Above: Old West Guns playing cards created via a Kickstarter project in 2018 by Gun Channels, USA.
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.
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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