Cool T80/T206 Find -- Cairo Monopol
 

During my quest to complete a back run on the T206's I developed a few new passions as I was intrigued at the varying levels of difficulty and rarity for several backs. That led me to the T80's which shared the the T205's characteristics on the front with the gold and borders but came with some of the rarest T206's backs. As I'm aware they were part of some of the last year and run for the T206 printing I also was confused at the reasoning of why a random back for the Cairo Monopol was printed only for the T80 and never appeared for the T206. As some of them have shown up in locations outside the US this might explain the reason why it is so rare. The one I have was acquired from a vendor located in the U.K. Also the even rarer blank backs for the T80's were only distributed in New Zealand (which is also where I came across mine).

Through all my research I never came across a picture of a Cairo Monopol tobacco pack or packaging. Which also raised my intrigue much as the T206 Cobb backs have never been found in their packaging but were believed to come from those tins. Yet recently my luck struck again and I acquired a Cairo Monopol pack and I wanted to share its picture with the rest of you. I can't make out the date on the tax stamp (but it has to be sometime after 1901), and it is odd as the box has one factory on it and the tax stamp has another.

Either way enjoy and I would love to hear any thoughts of it.

Interesting that the slide is factory 363 and the tax stamp is factory 65. Is the factory 363 printed on a label?
Maybe they had them all set to go at factory 65 and needed some at 363 so they distributed them from there?

Nice pickup!

Steve B

Yeah that's interesting you bring that up because I actually noticed from the pictures that the side of the box with the factory 363 appears to have a border around it, like it was placed over the original factory section. I'm going to take a closer look at the box tonight and see if that is a paper overlay or something else.

The Tax stamp date is 1907. The T80 cards were printed and issued in early Spring 1911 with these 4 backs (and very seldom found Old Mill backs).
The very attractive Cairo Monopol pack you have did not contain these T80 cards.
Nevertheless, it's a neat item and thanks for displaying it.

http://photos.imageevent.com/tedzan7...HiAdjGen25.jpg
http://photos.imageevent.com/tedzan7...Tolstoi25b.jpg


TED Z
.

Post it over on the nonsports side, and don't forget to show the front. ;-)

Hi Ted, and thanks for looking at the tax stamp. I still can't make out the printed date but the factories are clearly different from the card (factory 30). But just finding a Cairo Monopol shell around that time frame is what I am really happy with seeing as I haven't found another example before. Has anyone seen another and if so any from factory 30?

I also have all five T80 backs (uzit, old mill, Lenox, tolstoi, and the blank):

That forum is practically dead...and for me the fronts don't matter at all. I honestly wouldn't care if this was an error card and honus wagner was printed on the front :) all that matters to me are the backs. I would try and get a better example of this Cairo Monopol (no pin hole would be nice) but these rarely ever become available. There's only that really over priced one on eBay that I've seen in the last few years.

I can't read the date on the cancel, but the series is 1901, which was used from 1901-08. Still no T-80 inside, but I can't imagine a brand that had fairly low sales would have changed the package much unless they really needed to.

Steve B

Steve B

The Cairo Monopol Cigarette pack shown above had to be modified in order to include a T80 card.
The T80 cards with Cairo Monopol back advertisements (Factory #30 N.Y.) could only be inserted
in a pack designated Factory #30.....as required by the Federal Tobacco Tax law.


TED Z
.

nice pack
 

Nice Cairo pack (even if not in date period) very cool. I'm pretty sure Ive got some Old Mill & Uzit T80s still. Maybe one Monopol left, they are tough.

Just in case there is any confusion I never meant to imply that this pack housed a T80, or the one in my photo. I simply was putting a face finally to the boxes that likely housed them as I have never seen another example before.

Thanks ;).

Of course, it's the wrong year and wrong factory whichever factory it's from. If it is, the paper label factory change is interesting.

The point was that I think the brand would probably have used a pack that was the same except for the factory number.

Although, when did they become part of ATC? The tax stamp appears to be their own. And I can't recall seeing an ATC brand without an ATC cancel on the stamp.
The factory change on the tax stamp probably wouldn't have bothered the federal tax people. The accounting was done once the stamp was cancelled, and the biggest thing was collecting the tax.

Steve B

I Like packaging and tobacco packs quite a bit. Nice stuff...

"That forum is practically dead"
 

I hope they don't find out right away.......

Lol, it's sad, because I think there is a large following for the non-sports tobacco cards, and the people there have a wealth of knowledge. Problem is that since it's so slow a lot of the members don't check the forums regularly. So any requests for trades/buys/sales or even information sometimes doesn't get answered for months if not years. I still have people emailing about posts I made there a few years ago that weren't ever originally replied to. It's a bit crazy. I like the forums but maybe they need to update the forum software or something to encourage more members to stay active.

Very cool find of a tough tobacco packaging product. I have a near complete set of T80s, missing just one I think, (goes with my gold border obsession) and a near complete back run as well missing only...you guessed it, Cairo Monopol. My little set has taken a back seat lately and I rarely think about it but thanks for bringing it up again.

Joshua

Does that mean this forum is on life-support? The non-sports pickup thread has 50% the posts that the pickup thread has here.

Maybe the non-sports forum can spice things up like they do here. Maybe a few posts on local card shows. Or something interesting and new regarding bid retractions or fake cards on eBay. How about Auction house reminders? Or "Show your whatevers".

Actually, some of those aren't bad ideas.

T80s
 

I'm pretty sure The T80 Cairo on eBay now was mine. Price seems a tad high? but maybe he's looking for the St Patricks day pot of gold. I sold my set 3 yrs ago. lets see whats left in this stack here,,,, 2 Old Mills , 2 Uzits , 3 Cairo Monopols :)

Jared,
 

great stuff my friend!

Jim R is an expert on these:)