Operation Iraqi Freedom playing cards
Operation Iraqi Freedom: U.S. Military heroes playing cards, 2003.
This pack by American Art Classics, Inc. eulogises the American service men and women who served or were then currently serving as part of Operation Iraqi Freedom. The aces and court cards present photos of individual political, military, naval or Air Force leaders. The 2 of each suit carries the emblems of the Marine Corps, Army, Navy and Air Force, while the remaining pip cards display photos of various armaments and military equipment (missiles, tanks, helicopters, etc.). This pack is a bridge-size pack (63 x 88 mm.) and has 2 wild cards (jokers), one card called “The Golden Ace” dedicated to the brave men and women of our United States Armed Services, and a fourth extra card, one side of which displays the Stars and the other side the Stripes of the US flag.
An otherwise identical variant of this pack exists, with no indication of publisher, but which does not have the 3rd and 4th extra cards, has smaller indices, and is closer to a poker-size pack (56 x 86 mm.)
Above: Operation Iraqi Freedom playing cards by American Art Classics, Inc., 2003.
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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