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I first started collecting Kem cards and for awhile, that was all I collected. Before my current career, I was a professional poker dealer and we used Kem cards where I worked. I had always been into cards and poker, so once I got out of the casino industry and into IT, I decided one day to build a poker room in the house. And I needed cards. So naturally, I bought a set of Kems. Below is the culmination of that fateful event. Each of the pictures below were scans made by me of cards that I own. I am currently up to 1325 unique decks in the entire collection, but here we are going to focus just on Kem.

From what I have been able to determine, I am missing about 20 "sets" of consumer Kems. There are hundreds (if not more) of custom sets, such as decks for casinos, corporations, commissions, etc. Normally I do not collect these unless they are interesting to me.

What I am missing from the Kem Consumer line:
Gold Band
La Paloma
Night and Day
Unicorn v1

This is what I do have:
ALHAMBRA ALPHA AMERICAN HORSES ANGEL

ARABESQUE ARROW ATHENS BALLOONS

BICENTENNIAL BLOSSOMS CAMELLIA CAMEO

CARDINAL CARNATIONS CAROUSEL CASINO CIRCLE-BACKS

CHECKMATE CHRYSANTHEMUM CLADDAH CLIPPER SHIP

CLUB COUNTRY GEESE CREST CROWN

CROWN v2 DAISIES DANCE DECOR

DOGWOOD DUCHESS EAGLE EGRET

Is there a complete list of consumer line decks that you're working from?

Thanks for the post (and more to come it would seem )

FANTASY FAWN FLAMINGO FLORENCE

FLORENTINE FLYING CLOUD FOREST FAWN GAMECOCK

GARLAND GOLF GOLF v2 GUIDING STAR

HARVEST HEMISPHERE HUMMINBIRD IMPRESSIONS

INLAY IRIS JACQUARD JADE

KENT LIBERTY LIGHTHOUSE MALLARD

MAPLE MEHNDI MILLENNIUM MONACO

MOONFLOWER MOSAIC OLD GLORY ORCHID

PAISLEY PANTHEON PANTHER PHAROAH

PINOCHLE POKER POLO RADIANCE

REGENCY ROSES ROYALE SCROLL

SEAGULL SEQUENCE SEVILLE SHELLS OF THE SEA

SOVEREIGN SPINNAKER STARGAZER STREAMLINE

TALL SHIP THE HUNT UNICORN VICTORIAN

WATER LILY WINDROSE WISTERIA YORK

The decks below were special decks created in 1941-43 for the War Effort during WWII. They were designed to fit inside the front pocket of GI's and Aviator Pilots. They all came with a leather case with a snap. If you ever have the chance to obtain one, there is a strong possibility that it saw its fair share of combat.

WAR EAGLE MINI
Normandy

These decks are just some casino decks, corporation decks or commission decks that I found interesting and have picked up over the years. They were produced by Kem.

AMERICAN EXPRESS AUGUSTA BARNES & NOBLES FOXWOODS CASINO

These decks are just some casino decks, corporation decks or commission decks that I found interesting and have picked up over the years. They were produced by Kem.

ELITE B LL BEAN ROYAL CARIBBEAN SIX CARD CHARLIE

These decks are just some casino decks, corporation decks or commission decks that I found interesting and have picked up over the years. They were produced by Kem.

WORLD POKER TOUR

So that is it for now insofar as Kem cards go. As the collection grows (slow process at this point) I will add new scans here. I hope you enjoyed the pictures and I hope that it helps out anyone else looking to collect or identify Kem cards!

hsbc wrote:Is there a complete list of consumer line decks that you're working from?

Thanks for the post (and more to come it would seem )

Unfortunately, there is not a master list anywhere. If you have a little bit of luck, you will have a Kem Order Card in your set that will tell you the name of the decks. Or, if you have the original packaging (and trust it) it will tell you the name of the deck there also. Other than that, it is old newspaper adverts, Google-Fu and talking with Chuqii to track down the names of these decks. This is a large part of why I loaded all of these scans into https://www.portfolio52.com/ as well as wanting to add them here. It was painful tracking down the names of unknown decks...and I still have one that is a mystery. 95% of these have not been produced since the 90's and fully 50% haven't been produced since the 60's.