Collectibles: Tom Tyler on the R-94 Movie Scenes cards - Part 1

One of the most sought after movie card collectibles are those belonging to the R-94 Movie Scenes.  It could be that these are rare, especially those being Tom Tyler on the front of these cards, much like the United Postal Card Supply Company arcade cards, which makes them highly collectible. The R-94 cards were manufactured in two different sets, each set being two slightly different sizes. According to “The American Card Catalog: The Standard Guide on All Collected Cards and Their Values” edited by J P Burdick et al, the R-94 cards were thought to have been originally distributed with either gum or candy (cards with an R designation were included with one or the other edible product; cards bearing a W indicated being one of a set of strip cards). These cards are blank backed, the left and right edges serrated, a common depiction of strip cards, or a series of cards sold from a single strip.

The first set of R-94 strip cards, or R-94-1, measure 3" x 2 3/8”in size and came in the following colors, with one film scene often appearing in multiple monochrome colors: red, green, brown, blue, and purple. Not all R-94-1 cards are of film scenes, however; some of them were of solo shots of Hollywood stars, such as Thelma Todd and Milton Sills. It is this set which produced a series of card scenes from “Terror Mountain” (1928) with Tom in each scene.

The R-94 cards were most likely distributed as early as 1929.