Lively Game, from the Talk of the Diamond set (N135) issued by Duke Sons & Co., a branch of the American Tobacco Company 1888

This is “Lively Game,” a lithograph made around 1888 by W. Duke Sons & Co., a branch of the American Tobacco Company. It’s made using a printing technique where an image is drawn on a stone or metal plate, treated to retain ink in those areas, and then printed. The lithograph shows a caricatured figure running from a bear, with a baseball game oddly placed in the background. The card is from a series called "Talk of the Diamond," used as trade cards to promote Duke's tobacco products. What’s fascinating is the intersection of leisure, labor, and consumption. Baseball, an emerging popular pastime, is juxtaposed with the image of a hunt, all to sell tobacco. The card itself, a mass-produced object, speaks to the industrialization of both leisure and vice. These cards were not high art, but they were meticulously crafted using advanced printing techniques. They blur the lines between advertising, popular culture, and artistic expression, reminding us that even everyday objects carry layers of social and cultural meaning.