“Yankee notion” was an original card deck published in 1856 by Thomas W. Strong. Similar to the more usual and now standard french / international playing cards various games can be played with these cards and 16 were published along with them.
The deck differs substantially in structure from the standard deck. It has 5 suits of 10 cards each, and doesn’t come with extra cards like the joker. The ranks are digits from 0 to 9, and the 5 suits are faces, flags, eagles, stars and shields.
The rules have been included in “Hoyle’s Games” by Thomas Frere, likely to help market them. These are the most comprehensive rules that can be found today, other accounts usually repeat what’s said there in perhaps more readable prose. The 1875 edition of Hoyle’s Games can be found here on archive.org and a pdf is also archived locally here.
Besides their inclusion in various editions of “Hoyle’s Games” from the 1850s to the 1880s, these cards very rarely get mentioned. and almost exclusively by games researchers at that. Perhaps the most well-known mention is in Sid Sackson’s “A gammut of games” pages 26-27, where he only discussed the structure of the deck and wrote about one of the games, specifically hekaton. This also seems to be the first mention outside of Frere’s Hoyle, almost a hundred years after. The wikipedia page for a gamut of games seems to be the only mention of these cards on wikipedia.
They also get mentioned in this article about the joker card (archive) which is noteable for being the only source that explicitly states who their designer was, although none of their sources mention it.
However, it’s likely that’s the case, since Thomas W. Strong ran a successful humor magazine by the same name and there was a sketch in the September 1854 edition called “A black joke” which is a name of one of the games, although it’s unclear what they have in common other than the name.
In this article references to games, cards, suits, ranks, etc refers to those of the yankee notion cards unless mentioned otherwise.
Likewise “the book” refers to Thomas Frere’s Hoyle’s games 1875 edition.
Most games played with these cards are adaptations or were otherwise inspired by games played with standard playing cards, and this description reuses as many terms from them as would make sense.
The suits are divided into two classes, “figures” or pip cards, comprising the suits of flags, eagles, stars and shields, and the face cards, comprising on the suit of faces.
There are 10 ranks in each suit from 0 to 9. they nearly always count face value, with the exception of the 0s which sometimes counts as a 10. The book often calls them graces, especially figured 0s.
There are no face ranks as in standard playing cards, but instead the face suit featured various characters on its cards. Their names are as follows:
I’ll refer to most of these by their rank number, with the exception of John and Sally Smith when they have special significance.
I’ll refer to the cards as rank of suit, for example nine of flags, zero of shields, 5 of faces. To be brief, sometimes I’ll use a shorthand rs where r is the rank, as 0, 1, …, 9, ands is a letter identify the suit, as follows:
The two-character notation is my own. The book usually uses the full names, the 0s are usually called Z’s.
In the game of pick-nick there’s a system of pairing suits similar to the colors of standard playing cards. One pair is flags and stars, while the other is shields and eagles. Since I couldn’t find any picture of these cards I don’t know if they shared color. Note that faces aren’t in either pair. This makes sense in the context of pick-nick, as will be described later, but they can’t be adequately used in, say, an adaptation of Klondike. I’ll talk more about this later.
All games are played clockwise, and the deal, if not otherwise decided, is decided by lowest cards, 0s being low. The player on the right of the dealer may cut, and the player to the left begins play and is called the elder hand.
The trick taking games played with these cards are similar to whist in play and scoring, but there are things that need clarifying.
During the deal, the first card delt to the dealer is face-up. If it’s a pip, then it’s suit is the trump suit. if it’s a face, the second card to the dealer is face-up again and so on until a trump suit is picked at which point the dealing continues without any face-up cards.
In a 4-player game there are 2 cards left over at the end of the deal. The first of these should be dealt to elder hand, and the last to the dealer. They should have one card more than the other players and at the end they’ll play out the last trick between each other. If neither of them won the trick before, whose partner who won that trick starts first.
The leader of the trick may play any card other players in clockwise order must play as follows:
The winner of the trick is decided as follows (0s high):
A few examples to make the above rules clearer. Elder hand leads in all examples, and trumps are eagles:
NOte that the faces are still a separate suit, they aren’t just an extension like the queens and jack’s in sheepshead.
Note that the suits are shorter than in the standard deck, while 0s are sure winners, 9s are quite risky especially in a longer suit. Faces on their own aren’t sure winners, especially when cutting. If you want to get a sure trick out of 0F play it as soon as possible, before nobody voids it by cutting.
I’ll go through the 16 games as mentioned in the book, retelling the rules and adding comments if I see fit.
The descriptions here shouldn’t contradict the book just say them in a hopefully clearer way. I’m not aware of any current players of these games, if there are any I’d love to hear from them about the way they play them.
Some of the games are trick-taking games, most similar to whist in play and scoring, with the exception of teasers which is an adaptation of 66.
I’ll describe the games accurately, and later discuss my suggested changes, that I’ll clearly note are not official rules.
Unless otherwise specified, the general notes abouttrick-taking games above applies to each game in this category.
2, 3, or 4 people may play, and according to the book it’s best with 2 or 2 teams of 2.
The goal is to be the first to reach the target score. When two play, the target is 10 points, When 3 it’s 15, and with 4 it’s 20.
Deal 13 cards to each player, unless there are 4, in which case each gets 12 and the last card goes to elder and dealer, as described above.
The play continues. won tricks should be separate, to make scoring easier.
To score for tricks, the side must have at least a certain number of tricks when 2 or 2 teams play it’s more than 6, when 3 play it’s more than 4. Each trick over counts a point.
In addition, each face (tilter) captured counts a point regardless of its number. However, a side can’t win by just capturing faces, they must win by tricks.
This can introduce confusion. For example, if a team has 16 points, won 3 points from tricks and 5 from tilters, how many points would they have? Given that the book mentions “having only one point to make on a new deal” it’s likely in the spirit of the game that the tricks get counted first, and if they haven’t crossed the target score then the tilters are counted unless if they wouldn’t count over the target in which case they don’t.
On average, much more points would be won on tilters than on tricks. That’s why I suggest scoring tilters similar to tricks, 1 each over half, so the side that captured most of them would score number of faces minus 5.
Played by 4 players in 2 teams of 2.
The object of the game is to score 20 points, as follows:
Deal and play are the same as in tilters. With the following exception: if the 0 of faces (John Smith) and the 1 of faces (Sally Smith) are played in the same trick, then the player who played the 1 wins the trick, regardless of trumps or other faces, and he wins 5 points for John Smith. If this doesn’t occur then the holder of the 0 of faces wins the 5 points regardless of who captures it via trumps.
As described by the book:
Mrs. Smith (Sally, John’s wife), is the faced ace, and always captivates and takes poor John against all opposition whenever she falls in the same trick with him. No trump can prevent her securing her prize. In her husband’s presence (in the same trick) she is superior to John and all other cards, and takes the trick. Separate from him she is the lowest and humblest of the Faces. On the contrary, John in her presence is nobody, but away from her he is the highest Face, or A No. 1.
Further, on his lead the holder of the 1 of faces can call for the 0 of faces (if he doesn’t hold him himself) By saying the following:
Come forth, Great John Thou Paragon! My voice I’m sure you know!
In response, the player holding the 0 must play it and may say the following:
I know that voice! I’ve got no choice! It’s hard, but I must go!
Whoever reaches the target score first wins the game, counted in the order John Smith, tricks, faces, graces.
The target score is way too low, I recommend a target score of at least 40 points. I also recommend changing the scoring schedule as follows:
For the hold of 0F, the goal is to play and win the trick with it, without falling to the holder of 1F Likewise, the holder of 1F wants to get the lead and call for the 0F. The other players should focus most on tricks and winning faces. The 9F could be a good lead, hoping that the next to players hold 0F and are too afraid to play it and give away their faces for the face score.
This game may be played by from 2 to 6 players, but the book focuses on the 4 player version with partnerships.
This game uses a reduced deck, including all the faces but only 1, 7, 8, 9 and 0 of pip suits. This makes for a total of 30 cards.
The order of cards differs among trump and non-trump suits. The trump suit is ordered as follows:
Other suits go as usual from 0 to 1, but one suit wouldn’t have its one. The filly is the part of the trump suit and not the suit on it. Thus, if the filly is the only trump in your hand you must play it to a trump lead.
Each player is dealt 5 cards, neither or elder nor dealer getting extra like in other games. The next card afterwards is flipped up. If it’s a face, flip up another one over it until there’s a pip-suited card on top. This is the proposed trump suit. If there were any faces flipped up, the dealer may take them and discard an equal number of cards in return.
Each player in turn starting from elder may either accept the proposed trump suit or pass. Traditionally elder hand, his partner, or the dealer would say “I order it up” while the dealer’s partner would say “I assist” to accept the proposed trump suit. There’s no other difference in procedure.
If all players pass the proposed trump card is turned down and now each player may either propose a different trump suit or pass. If all players pass again the hand is thrown in and dealing happens again.
Once someone has accepted a trump suit, whether the proposed or another one, their team become the declarers and the other team become the defenders.
The player who accepted the trump suit may decide to “go alone” before play begins. His partner doesn’t participate in the game only the declarer and two opponents.
Play as in other trick-taking games, starting from elder hand.
At the end of the round the declarers count the number of tricks they took, and score as follows:
The points for getting pick, nick or pick-nick are increased by 2 when the declarer goes alone.
Game is 7 points, but 10 might make for a more comfortable game.
This game is an obvious adaptation of euchre with more scoring oppertunities but also harsher punishments. Euchre players should keep the following in mind, however.
For those who think that punishments for getting picked, nicked, and pick-nicked are too harsh, reducing points given to the opponents by 1 returns it to something more similar to traditional euchre.
The games in this category are played with hard score, physical counters that are given from player to player over the course of a session. The counters could be coins, chips representing money, or something utterly worthless.
These games aren’t all just games of chance, and as mentioned above don’t need to be played for money. However the book does imply it was meant to be played with money, and some of the games are similar to actual casino games.
Playable by up to 8, but probably best with 3 to 5.
Each player puts 1 counter into the pot, and the dealer deals them 6 cards in batches of 3.
Each player in turn, starting from elder hand, plays one card face up. After everyone has played a card face up, subsequent cards are played face down.
The goal is to call out “Quien sabe” when all cards played, face up and face down, are greater but as close to the quien sabe number. The quien sabe number (from now on qsn) is equal to 10 times the number of players in the game, so 20 when there are 2, 30 when there are 3, and so on.
The player who played the last card must either call out “Quien sabe” or “I pass”. Each player in turn after him has the same choice, and only once everyone has passed may the next player play another card.
Nobody can call out “Quien sabe” on the first round, when all cards are face up. If the sum of the face up cards comes to within 10 of the qsn before all face up cards are played, the hand is redealt.
When a player calls out quien sabe, all cards are turned face up and somed together, 0s being worth 10.
This is a simple game, which while given a fair bit of choice to the player doesn’t give enough information to make a good one. There are two conflicting objectives: calling the qsn exactly, or calling when the sum is the highest for the greatest reward.
It’s all too easy to spoil the game by always playing so that the sum of the shown cards gets within 10 of the qsn, especially when in conspiracy with another player.
The book suggests the game can be played with soft score, each player summing their winnings with pen and paper and the first player to reach 100 points winning the game.
It’s possible to increase the ante or the rate at which differences are paid out.
Playable by 2 to 4 people, each for themselves.
The objective is to win the pot by holding the lowest hand after discarding fifteens.
The dealing schedule is as follows:
After dealing, there’s an auction for each card in the reserve. each player, starting from elder, may either bid or pass. Each bid must be higher than the last, and a player who has passed may not rejoin the bidding for the same card, but he may bid in the auction for the next card. Once everyone except 1 has passed, the bidder pays the amount of his bid into the pot and draws one card from the top of the reserve. If everybody passes, the reserve is discarded and the game continues to the showdown. Likewise once the whole reserved has been sold.
Once the bidding is over but before the showdown players may make side bets among themselves. These bets should be kept separate from the pot, since the winner of the pot doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with them. The book doesn’t go over what kinds of side bets are allowed, but I suggest not allowing players to make bets about themselves or bets on who will not win the pot, but bets on who has the highest hand is of course allowed.
Finally, each player in turn may discard one or more cards so that each batch when summed up is equal to 15. A card can’t be a part of more than one batch. Zeros count 0, while they can’t participate in 15s they don’t hurt the total and in fact help in numerical ties, (see below). Once a player has made his discards they are taken away and they are out of the game.
The player with the lowest hand, by addition, wins the pot, and each player must pay him the difference between their total and his. At this point all side bets are appropriately handled. If there are numerical ties for the lowest hand, it’s broken as follows:
Again, these rules only apply when there are numerical ties.
This is a banking game. One player is the banker, who handles the bets and the cards, and other players “the punters”. There can be various amount of punters, but after 10 it might get uncomfortable with a single deck.
Each player in turn buys cards from the banker at a rate of his choosing. The banker takes the payment, deals the player his cards face down, and once the first round of orders is complete players may buy additional cards at the same rate, as long as there are any left in the deck.
Once all the orders are complete, each player turns their cards over and get paid for each face they hold. For each face the banker pays the player the number on the face times the rate at which it was bought. The zero of faces coutns as 0, so it’s as good as any pip card. In this game,faces are called jokers and a hand without jokers is called a black joke.
This game is 10% in the banker’s favor, if a player buys all 50 cards at rate x, he would win $(1 + 2 + + 9)*x = 45x $ which is 5x less than the amount given to the banker. Removing 0s makes it an even game.
This game can be played by any number of people, but at most 5 can play comfortably with a single deck.
Remove the zeros from the deck, and afterwards deal n + 1 cards to each player where n is the number of players. Thus 3 cards are dealt to each player when 2 play, 4 when 3, and so on. Turn over the next card face up.
The object of the game is to win the pot by holding a hand whose total is equal to 5 times the number of cards in it, or in other words whose average is equal to 5. If nobody holds such a hand, they might improve it by getting the turn up.
The turn up can be gained in the following ways:
Elder hands starts by either bidding or consoling. Once he has consoled, he may not bid later but other players may join in consoling and afterwards “turn the corner” and bid.
Bluffing in this game can be quite profitable, either consoling for a card they want, or participating in the bidding to make others pay more. There’s a danger of others calling his bluff, forcing him to take a card he doesn’t want, perhaps at a quite hefty price. The book calls bluffing “jockeying” and failing to jockey is called “laming”.
If multiple people claim the pot, the winner is decided as when breaking ties in the game of bunkum.
It’s unclear how exactly bidding procedure is supposed to go, and with possibility of bluffing it’s hard to come up with a good system without proper playtesting. here’s a potential suggestion:
The dealer has an advantage in this system, if he wants the card and nobody else does, he only needs to pass during bidding and then console for nothing and get the card for free. Only way to fully solve it is to forbid the dealer from consoling. The advantage won’t apply to the player on his right, because they can’t be sure the dealer would pass too. This is all just theory for now.
5s make no difference to the scoring, and may be either buried when they’re turned up, or thrown out of the deck entirely.
It’s unclear how the pot is built, but each player paying in a suitable amount before the game would ensure that consoling can be supported with appropriate limits. Thus, the entry should be a multiple of the unit that is played for.
The text in quotes after the card name appear in the book but aren’t mentioned again. They were probably meant to describe cards further.↩︎