Glass & Tuscher, Leipzig, Saxony, was set up by Reinhard Johannes Glass and Leo August Tuscher in September 1906. Compared with most of the other postcard printers around at Leipzig then, G&T was a smaller sized business. But very specialized in picture postcard printing / export. Found at Perthestr. 2 in rented rooms with 2 collotype presses as well as some other production facilities and 12 workers by mid 1907. By 1910 the business had been moved to Bayersche Str. 77. Now G&T had a total of 7 presses (collotype / litho / letterpress) running and employed about 40 workers. The company stayed here until 1927 when they finally moved into their own factory building found at Breite Str. 7.
Not long after the outbreak of WW1 the business became a limited company and Leo Tuscher left. Reinhard Glass was managing director until December 1915 and parted, too. G&T was run now by Prof. Arthur Toepfer and later by a Dr. Carl Ruehle together with several silent partners. G&T continued printing postcards but also a number of other articles. The building breite Str. 7 survived WW2. The final entry in Klimsch printing trade directory 1950 edition reveals that a Hermann Hamkens had taken over former G&T business under his name plus formerly Glass & Tuscher.
Glass & Tuschers secret of success
The business was set up at a time when market conditions for collotype printed postcards were not too well anymore. Too much competition left only meagre profit margins. But G&T appers to have had a good in-house “workflow”, producing good to very good quality at low prices. They consequently issued new qualities and designs over and over again. This is well documented by the unusual high number of printing sample cards found.
Besides standard / high-quality (coloured) cards for national customers, as well as from Europe and overseas, G&T offered small runs of cards during the years prior to WW1. 200 cards, b/w (Graphit style) for 4 Marks 50 Pfennig plus 30 Pfennig postage. Somehow they must had made some money even by this way.
Sunset, Saskatoon, Canada. Publ. by local McKenzie’s Studio. No. 607. P/u June 1910. G&T code reads A 3150 10.
An article on G&T was published years ago in “The Postcard Album” issue 21. This four-pager can be downloaded free of charge as pdf-file.. Please use link found at bottom of page: TPA Articles
Glass & Tuscher card codes
Like many other postcard printers, G&T coded each card with an individual job number.
In 1907 they used plain numbers (up to 4-digit) found at the lower right corner on the address side. Something many other printers did, too. Identification of these G&T printed cards requires clearly identified samples to compare.
Between 1908-09 G&T used a modified number code, 2 numbers standing for the year, then space, followed by a 3- to 4-digit car number. For example 08 8758. Now this type of coding was used already by local, big company of Dr. Trenkler & Co. since 1907. This had probably led to some irritation.
From 1910 on G&T added a capital letter prefix to the card number, the year date now at the end. I use to call this the Alphabet Code. Example: A 3150 10. The numbering always runs to 9999. Then the following alphabetical letter was used. During times when business boomed, two different letters for the same year are common. Trusting that reprints received a new, actual then, code. Below you find a list of G&T card codes year by year I have collected myself / were kindly provided by fellow collectors. Listed are the lowest and highest card code imprinted found so far.
D. A. R. Wharf, Yarmouth N.S. Canada. Publ. by local ”The Yarmouth Portraits Co.” Not p/u, no card or series info. G&T code D 848 12 = early 1912.
Leipzig, Saxony. View of ‘Ratskeller’. Publ. by local Fritz Mueller. Mailed to Holland in April 1937. G&T code A 1008 33. An almost photo-like print, but actually collotype. Quality named “Opal-Glanz”.
1910
A 475 - 9478
B 1488 - 3325
1911
B 5278 - 9420 C 421 - 8182
1912
C 9691
D 848 - 8276
E 3668 - 3703
1913
E 6208 - 9923 F 1401 - 9075
1914
G 5002 - 9028 H 762 - 4549
1915
H 5971 - 9428 J 581 - 4887
1916
J 5175 - 7741 K 800
1917
K 400 - 6068
1918
K 6074 - 7329
1919
L 2231 - 8260
1920
M 61 - 2854
1921
M 6422 - 9476
1922
N 3406 - 8956
1923
O 4068 - 5562
1924
O 9269 - 9906 P 48 - 9938 Q 644
1925
Q 1850 - 9828 R 5909
1926
R 9680 - 9828 S 1555 - 8592
1927
T 2261 - 7555 U 4829
1928
V 1432 - 5213
1929
V 9290 - 9325 W 155 - 8228
1930
W 5177
X 303 - 9106
Y 1219
1931
Y 4673 - 7419
Z 482 - 4614
1932
A 6229
Z 9204
1933
A 6513 - 9784
B 1778 - 5899
1934
B 6006 - 8191 C 4840 - 6641
1935
D 3725 - 8611
1936
E 1111 - 5411 F 5031
1937
F 2436 - 7470 G 2436 - 9185
1938
H 6670
I 5673 - 9228
1939
K 340 - 6748
L 2299 - 6196
1940
L 8745 - 9102
M 3673 - 9519
1941
N 9657
O 3454 - 7569
1942
P 707 - 9265
Q 3175 - 3220
1943
Q 9466
R 222 - 4738
The list with G&T card codes is based on some 500 card finds Should be understood as a “rough” survey only. The entire G&T production might easily amount to more than 40,000 different cards incl. reprints. during a period of more than 30 years. Few letters are still missing, were probably not used.
I do not collect Glass & Tuscher printed cards myself. Just keep them when they come my way. If you have any samples with code numbers not yet listed, please let me know. Thank you!
Special thanks to: Arne Sandström, Sweden, Ralf Hewig, Germany, Adam Katzeff, Sweden, Jan Spoorenberg, The Netherlands, Jean Ritsema, USA, Gokhun Yilmaz, Turkey, Volker Cremers, Germany and Branislav Kovacevic.
