If you’ve never been to Colonial Williamsburg—pride of our mutually native Virginia, along with ham, peanuts, and cigarettes—we’d recommend it. The historical park is some beautifully strange combination of Busch Gardens amusement park minus the rides and a giant, constant colonial-era LARP event (live action role playing), complete with battle reenactments, settlement tours, and in-chartacer crafters, glass-blowers, townspeople, and shop keeps.
Years back, on a work trip to the park, I bought this deck of beautifully illustrated playing cards from one such shop keep and have them to this day. They’re reproductions of 18th-century playing cards featuring a selection of Aesop’s Fables, based on a deck printed by I. Kirk circa 1759.
Primary take-aways—Aesop loved the “long s” (a confusingly complicated writing practice we’re happy died out long ago), had a thing for foxes, and did not care for crows.
Greek jerk.
You can order online from Colonial Williamsburg…but then you’d miss out on the in-character shop keep’s totally amusing befuddlement over your strange paper money with confusing faces on it and/or shock at this off plasticine card you wish to somehow barter with. Oh, LARPing.
