Picture 1: Rare one-way Back made by the N.Y Consolidated Card Co. for the Squeezers #35 deck
Picture 2: Abraham Hart
Picture 3: Charles Henry Hart
Picture 4: Charles Henry Hart
Samuel Hart, a legend in the history of American Playing Cards, was born in Philadelphia in 1818. When a youth he was employed in the auction rooms of the Messrs. Thomas and became later in life widely known as the maker of playing cards. Coming from a long line of stationers and booksellers, Hart became acquainted with the business of paper and stationery manufacture from an early age. Hart’s immediate family had been in the business since 1831. His extended family also had similar business interests, having stores and proprietorships extending all the way from Philadelphia to New York.
Beginning his career working as an apprentice for his uncle, Lewis Joseph Cohen, Hart got his start in the family stationer business in New York City. He was made vice president of the Consolidated Card Company when that organization was formed in New York. He was also president of the Peerless Brick Company and was at one time a director of the American District Telegraph Company.
Hart was married to Julia (Leavey) Hart and leaves a son and three daughters. He died on Tuesday night of June 2, 1885, from congestion of the lungs, at his residence, 1819 Chestnut Street and was sixty-seven years of age at the time of his death.
The son of Samuel Hart, named Charles Henry Hart, was a lawyer, art critic and historian. Born in Philadelphia, February 4, 1847, he was also a nephew of Abraham Hart (1810-1885), once a well-known publisher of Philadelphia. On the paternal side he was of Dutch descent. His mother, who was native of London, England, was of English ancestry on her father’s side. Her mother was the daughter of a Frenchman named Andrade whose wife was a Spanish lady named Rodriquez.
The early education of Charles Henry Hart was acquired in private schools and under the direction of special tutors. His legal studies were pursued in the office of Hon. Samuel H. Perkins, and also in the Law Department of the University of Pennsylvania, from which he was graduated in 1869, having been admitted to the Bar in November of the previous year.
For twenty-five years he practiced law in Philadelphia, rising rapidly in the profession and acquiring a reputation as an able and conscientious councilor. In early 1894 a serious railroad accident so disabled him as to necessitate his confinement within doors for a period of two years, which finally resulted in his permanent withdrawal from practice.
After his recovery he devoted his time to literature and art, in both of which he had been a close student from his youth. Not only was he one of the best known art critics in America, but may be said to have been a pioneer in the appreciation of the art of America portraits painters. He was recognized on both sides of the Atlantic as an expert in historical portraits, his judgment having several times been adopted by the National Portrait Gallery of London. He was an earnest advocate of the superiority of English art to that of the French, and to his endeavors may be largely attributed the present high appreciation in the United States of the works of English artists.
He was director of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in 1882-1902, and as chairman of the exhibition committee instituted in 1887 the first exhibition of historical portraits in this country. In 1903 he served as chairman of the committee on retrospective art at the World’s Columbian Exposition. In 1889 he was appointed a member of the committee of fifty to arrange the celebration in New York City of the centennial anniversary of the inauguration of Pres. Washington, being the only non-resident thus honored.
He was a member of the American Historical Association, the historical societies of Massachusetts, Maine, Long Island, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, Georgia, etc.; the New England Historical and Genealogical Society, the Essex Institute, Philadelphia Society of Etchers, and the Academy of Natural Sciences. He was the author of articles upon Philadelphia in the Encyclopedia Britannica (1885-1903), and also of: “Bibliographia Lincolniana”; “Life Portraits of Great Americans”; “Portraits of Washington” and many others.
Charles Henry Hart was thrice married: First on November 16, 1869 to Armine, daughter of John Nixon; on February 16, 1905 to Marianne Livingston, daughter of William Lacy Phillips, of Philadelphia and on December 7, 1912, to Anita, daughter of Senor Don Alfonso Gonzales y Arabe, of Sevilla, Spain. There was one son by the second marriage, Charles Henry Hart, Jr.
The son of Samuel Hart died in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, July 29, 1918.
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