S81 Silks - Some Updates from a Coupon
 

This evening I was searching through some various tobacco coupons in my collection, and I came across a Helmar coupon (rather large, almost 5 inches by 4 inches) that I frankly didn't recall owning. In fact, I never realized it was a coupon for the S81s and L1s until I looked closely at it. What's more, it has a couple of interesting details that I certainly didn't know about S81s and L1s, so I thought I'd share.

First, the front of the coupon clearly states that the other expires on June 1, 1914. I know that 1912 is the generally accepted date for both S81s and L1s, but it seems that range can be expanded until 1914.

Even more interesting was a bit of fine print on the reverse. If you look near the bottom, it advertises, for the princely sum of 100 coupons, any silk of your choosing framed in glass. Now, has anyone seen an S81 in its original frame?

well
 

in the mid 1990's I contacted someone named Scott Jaimet (RIP) - a picker at the time (later joining Mastro and/or Oser) - and purchased 3 large leather premiums he said he had found in a broken frame which he claimed was original to the pieces. Wish I had asked him to send it.

As for the silk dates - in one form or another the production and distribution of silks and similar premiums/inserts continued through 1916.

BTW - there are a couple of variations for the larger coupon you referenced and for the truly anal - a variety of colors!

adding a few further comments - no, I've never seen the premiums under glass. Bottom left corner of the coupons have the issuance dates. The framing for such an item would likely have been quite cheaply manufactured similar to what was used in their other promotions like that found with the Turkish Trophies advertising pieces or Zira examples where the silk is falling from the pack....... Like the snake oil salesmen of yesteryear and the eBay seller of today - there was a lot of "poetic license" in use.

They were probably all taken out quickly to display or look at. I wonder if the glass frames were very plain looking and lacking any id? It's hard to explain why we haven't seen any at all.

Here is a one half cent coupon similar to the coupon shown above. The Satin Designs List of Baseball Players includes players from in the 1911 T3 Turkey Red Series and adds four new players - the first four on the list, which are: numbers 86, 87, 89, & 90.


I've not seen an S81 in a glass frame. This is how a typical 'Satin Designs' looked when initially distributed: