Card Number 206, Lizzie Hughs, from the Actors and Actresses series (N145-7) issued by Duke Sons & Co. to promote Duke Cigarettes
1880s
Medium
Albumen photograph
Dimensions
Sheet: 2 11/16 × 1 3/8 in. (6.8 × 3.5 cm)
Classification
Photographs|Ephemera
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
The Jefferson R. Burdick Collection, Gift of Jefferson R. Burdick
Accession Number
63.350.208.145.7.238
Rights
Public Domain
Tags
Art Historical Context
This delicate albumen photograph from the 1880s is card number 206 in the Actors and Actresses series (N145-7), issued by W. Duke, Sons & Co. to promote Duke Cigarettes. Measuring just over two and a half inches tall, it features a portrait of actress Lizzie Hughs, one of many performers celebrated in this popular trading-card set. Tobacco companies of the era distributed such cards inside cigarette packs, encouraging collectors to complete sets while subtly associating smoking with glamour and entertainment. The use of albumen photography allowed for crisp, affordable reproduction of celebrity likenesses on a mass scale, transforming personal portraits into everyday ephemera. These miniature cards helped shape early celebrity culture, giving audiences a tangible connection to stage stars they might otherwise only admire from afar. Today, this example belongs to the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Burdick Collection, preserving a charming snapshot of Victorian advertising, photography, and popular taste.
About the Artist
W. Duke, Sons & Co. · 1870–1920
**W. Duke, Sons & Co.: Pioneers of Chromolithographic Trade Card Art** W. Duke, Sons & Co., an American tobacco manufacturer, emerged from the entrepreneurial vision of Washington Duke (1820–1905) and his sons in Durham, North Carolina. After the Civil War, Washington abandoned farming in 1874 to join his eldest son, Brodie L. Duke, in the burgeoning tobacco trade, establishing a factory that for...