Educational playing cards

There is disclosed herein a deck of educational playing cards consisting of fifty-two cards divided into four suits, each suit being representative of two different forms of speech and being so marked. Each card in each suit is representative of two different letters of the alphabet, and is so marked, the thirteen cards in each suit being representative of the twenty-six letters of the alphabet.

The invention pertains to educational and amusement devices or games, and 
more particularly to a deck of word-forming playing cards, useful as an 
accessory to various games which are educational as to the various 
principal forms of speech and as to spelling. The deck is unique in this 
field in that it corresponds to a standard deck of cards in comprising 
fifty-two cards divided into four suits of thirteen cards each. There have 
been prior patents on decks of word-forming playing cards (e.g., U.S. Pat. 
Nos. 622,240; 627,046; 1,528,060; 1,557,824; and, 2,265,334), but these 
have involved numbers of cards other than the standard number of fifty-two 
cards, and have had no educational function as to the forms of speech. The 
novel deck of this invention is based on my observation that there are 
eight principal forms of speech, namely, nouns, pronouns, verbs, 
interjections, adverbs, adjectives, prepositions and conjunctions, twice 
the number of suits as is desired in a deck of playing cards, and that 
there are twenty-six letters in the alphabet, half the number of cards as 
is desired in a deck of playing cards. 
A deck of this invention comprises fifty-two playing cards, divided into 
four suits of thirteen cards each. Each suit is representative of two 
different forms of speech, and each card in each suit bears designations 
of the two different forms of speech represented thereby. Thus, the four 
different suits are representative of eight different forms of speech. 
Each card in each suit is representataive of two different letters of the 
alphabet, and bears designations of the two letters represented thereby. 
Thus, the thirteen cards in each suit are representative of the twenty-six 
letters of the alphabet. The deck therefore attains the object of 
corresponding to a standard deck of playing cards in having fifty-two 
cards divided into four suits of thirteen cards each, thereby being useful 
in playing a wide variety of card games, including standard games. For 
example, it is possible to play rummy-type games, in which sequences of 
cards spelling words are required to be made, with each sequence being in 
a suit denoting a particular form of speech. Another novel type of game 
that may be played will be described below, and it will be apparent that 
many different games may be played which are educational as to both 
spelling and the different forms of speech.

Referring to the drawings, a deck of playing cards of this invention is 
shown to comprise fifty-two cards divided into four suits of thirteen 
cards each. The four suits, shown separately in FIGS. 1-4, are 
respectively designated A, B, C and D. The thirteen cards in suits A-D are 
respectively designated A1-A13, B1-B13, C1-C13 and D1-D13. Suit A is 
representative of nouns and pronouns, and each of cards A1-A13 in this 
suit bears the designations NOUN and PRONOUN. Suit B is representative of 
verbs and interjections, and each of cards B1-B13 in this suit bears the 
designations VERB and INTERJECTION. Suit C is representative of adverbs 
and adjectives, and each of cards C1-C13 in this suit bears the 
designation ADVERB and ADJECTIVE. Suit D is representative of prepositions 
and conjunctions, and each of cards D1-D13 in this suit bears the 
designation PREPOSITION and CONJUNCTION. 
Each card in each suit is representative of two different letters of the 
alphabet. Thus, as to each suit, the thirteen cards, respectively, bear 
the pairs of letters A and B, C and D, E and F, G and H, I and J, K and L, 
M and N, O and P, Q and R, S and T, U and V, W and X, and Y and Z. For 
example, card A1 of suit A bears the letters A and B, card A2 bears the 
letters C and D, etc. 
As to any card, its suit may be observed from the designation of the forms 
of speech thereon, e.g., a card may be readily observed as in the 
noun-pronoun suit simply by reference to the words NOUN and PRONOUN 
thereon. However, the suits may be made more readily distinguishable by 
printing the words of the suits in different colors. For example, the 
letters and the words on the cards in suit A may be printed in black, 
those on the cards in suit B printed in red, those on the cards in suit C 
printed in green, and those on the cards in suit D printed in blue. Also, 
as shown, each card may have the pairs of letters for that card printed at 
diagonally opposite corners of the card and the form of speech 
designations printed at opposite sides of the card in reversed 
relationship. 
Since the deck corresponds to a standard deck of playing cards in respect 
to comprising four suits of thirteen cards each, it may be used in playing 
various games corresponding to standard card games, e.g. rummy-type games 
as above noted, and it may also be used in new games such as the following 
game which may be played by two, three or four players: 
Assuming there are four players in the game, each player is dealt thirteen 
cards. A word is selected from a compilation of suitable words. The form 
of speech of the selected word determines the trump suit. For example, 
assuming the selected word is SKYWARD, which is an adverb or adjective, 
the adverb-adjective suit is thereby established as the trump suit. The 
cards also are valued in accordance with the selected word. For example, 
again assuming the selected word is SKYWARD, cards with S on them are of 
the highest value, cards with K on them are second highest, etc. Cards 
with letters on them not in the selected word are valued in sequence after 
the last letter of the selected word. For example, again referring to 
SKYWARD as the selected word, in which D is the last letter, the C-D cards 
would be the cards of seventh value, and then would follow the E-F cards, 
G-H cards, I-J cards, etc. through the alphabet (excluding the cards 
bearing the letters S, K, W and R) to the U-V cards which would be of 
lowest value. This value sequence becomes readily apparent simply by 
arranging the cards in the hand by suits and by order in each suit 
according to the selected word. Play proceeds by the player to the left of 
the dealer playing a card. Each player must then follow suit, unless he is 
out of that suit, in which case he must play trump, or, if out of trump, 
any card at his discretion. If a trump is led, and the next player has a 
higher trump, he must play it. The player playing the highest card wins 
the play, meaning that he captures the four cards played. The object of 
the game is to score points by capturing all the letters of the selected 
word, secondly by capturing letters in any syllable of the selected word, 
(e.g. SKY or WARD), thirdly by capturing letters of the word, and fourthly 
by capturing cards. Points are preferably given as follows: one point for 
each card captured, two points for each card captured bearing a letter of 
the selected word and four points for each card captured bearing two 
letters of the selected word, three points for each captured syllable of 
the selected word, and, for capturing all the letter of the selected word, 
three times the number of syllables, plus a bonus of five points for 
capturing the word in trump. The mode of play and scoring emphasizes the 
part of speech the selected word is, the syllables of the word, and the 
spelling of the word, and the game and the mode of scoring are extremely 
conducive toward education of the players in these respects. 
In view of the above, it will be seen that the several objects of the 
invention are achieved and other advantageous results attained. 
As various changes could be made in the above constructions without 
departing from the scope of the invention, it is intended that all matter 
contained in the above description or shown in the accompanying drawings 
shall be interpreted as illustrative and not in a limited sense.