Winner Menko

During the menko era from the 1930s-1960s, menko manufactures would sell their menko products in dagashiya because this was the gathering place for the main buyers of their menko---schoolkids.  It would work something like this.  First, a particular company would print out a set of menko, wrap each individual menko in a handmade newspaper envelope and then string 100 or so packs together with a sting and form what is known as a taba pack.  About 7 or so of these menko would be randomly stamped with a number 1, 2 or 3 winner stamp on the back.  The manufacturing company would then package a prize sheet and uncut sheets of menko along with the taba pack and sell it to dagashiya wholesalers.  Dagashiya owners would then make their supply runs to these wholesalers and buy their stock of sweets as well as pick-up any taba packs that they might need or feel that they can sell.  The most popular theme for menko at the time were baseball, sumo and various anime characters.  Once back at the dagashiya, the owners would take the prize sheet from the taba pack and hang it up in the store.  Most often the uncut sheets of menko were glued to the prize sheet at the factory, but some had to be glued at the dagashiya.  Glue residue is quite common on many menko that survive today.  The prize sheet would normally have 1-#1 prize, 2-#2 prizes and 4-#3 prizes.  Usually the #1 prize would be a “supersized” menko of a popular yokozuna of the time of a sheet of 16 uncut menko from the set.  A typical #2 prize would be an uncut sheet of 4 or 8 menko and a typical #3 prize would usually be a pair of uncut menko.  The final process was for the owner to hang the taba pack from the ceiling by the string where kids would pay about 1 yen to pull an envelope from the pack.  If they opened the envelope and pulled a winner menko, they would get the corresponding prize according to their winner stamp.

Here are some different examples of winner menko: