Steven W. Bacon's Page

Steven,
I acquired a few Arbuckles and Lion cards on behalf of the Specialty Coffee Association of America for their collection, as samples.

For my personal collection I generally steer clear of things intended to be kept and/or traded, unless they are unique. I once came across a trading card for Gillies Coffee, the oldest coffee roaster in America, and snapped it up. Came to find out that the current owner of Gillies, who is a friend of mine and whose family is only the second owner of Gillies since it was founded in the 1840's, had no idea that Gillies ever produced trading cards. I had to give it to him, of course. A week after I sent it I received a package from him. It was an aluminum coffee sample tray (coffee buyers place samples of the raw green coffee in cardboard or aluminum sample trays on the table while they test, or “cup” the roasted coffee). The tray had “Arbuckles” stenciled on it. It is at least 100 years old and even though it is not ephemera, it is a prize. I guess, when you own a company that is 150 years old, you have this sort of stuff around.

I'm most attracted to letters, billheads, and to a lesser degree, advertising. Playing cards are a bit of an exception. I worked in a magic shop in high school (I worked for Stan Allen, who is now the publisher of Magic Magazine and joined T.E.N. as a "seed" member), so I have a soft spot for playing cards and grab decks here and there and tuck them away compulsively. If they feature coffee in some way, it’s like a double compulsion.

To this day, I have a hard time discarding an incomplete deck. While working at the magic shop, I became fairly proficient at throwing playing cards (thanks to Ricky Jay) and an incomplete deck became amo. I regularly won dollar bets from people who thought I couldn’t hit the “open” sign on the door while standing at the cash register about 25 feet away.

Okay, so that was a really long answer to a simple question.