A Match Covers B
The Angelus Matchcover Club was founded in 1951 in Los Angeles to serve the needs of area collectors of matchcovers which are matchbooks with the matches removed and flattened for keeping.
This site will specifically be used to show the covers of the Southern California area from the dawn of matchbooks through their now infrequent useage. We intend to begin with the Angelus Scruffy Striker collection of Los Angeles matchcovers which will attempt to show the city’s businesses, venues and anything in the burg that advertised by distributing matchbooks for smoking and other purposes alphabetically arranged.
From Scruffy Striker: This site will be continuous and updated regularly. When near completed a cross-referencing and numbering system will be added. There will also be constant changes and hopefully new additions which will be added as photos are acquired. We welcome photo examples of covers not pictured after june 2025, by which time we hope to have added the 12,000 plus items we have on hand. So if you don’t see it please send us picture and let us list it. Oh, and as always, Go Dodgers!
Shown and listed are any / all related L.A. match ephemera particularly matchboxes handed out just like the matchbooks and in particular concerns that used both or either. In some cases the condition of the material is less than desirable – beat up, torn, wadded, dirty, etc. but if they are so far the only representation available they are pictured anyway. There are also some playing cards, sugar cube wrappers, napkins appearing throughout connected to the covers shown.
The club still meets regularly 6 times a year (in 2025 at least) and issues an entertaining bulletin 4 times a year with a mail auction. You can find it on Facebook also if interested. You can request a copy or application for membership by emailing [email protected].
If and when we finish with the Los Angeles listing we intend to move into Hollywood, Venice, Culver City, etc. and other sections of L.A. that are actually communities within the limits and not actual cities or towns.
Collecting matchcovers was a major hobby throughout the country throughout the second half of the 1900’s and the material is constantly becoming available with the passing of time. It was and still is overall a relatively inexpensive hobby (although all of the material used to be free) and a great mirror into the past of businesses, fads & fashions, popular tastes and political forces and candidates. If you look for matchcovers on ebay generally the impression is given they are all very pricey and rare. That is only on ebay where most sellers are under the illusion they are selling the thousand dollar lemonade glass. There are of course some very rare and very sought after ones but the hobby remains quite reasonable in prices overall.