Size: 3" x 5"
Copyrighted: 1889
Lithographer: Donaldson Bros.

This is a series of 50 cards, numbered from 51 to 100 on the back of each card at the top center. This must have been one of the most popular series when it was originally issued (perhaps because many new states were being added to the union around this time), as the cards in this set seem to be the most readily available to today's collector.

The front of each card is a multi-colored illustration, in a horizontal format, which includes a map of one of the then-current 40 states (a count which was only correct from 11/2/1889 until 11/8/1889), 8 territories, Alaska and the District of Columbia, along with various vignettes depicting industries and scenery that the state was known for.

I'm aware of two cards in this series (so far) that have significant printing varieties on the front. Please see #57 - West Virginia and #94 - Rhode Island for detailed views of those varieties.

The back of each card contains identical text, in a vertical format printed in a shade of blue, with the left side containing the standard "Four Points" explaining the virtues of Arbuckles' Ariosa Coffee, and the right side explaining what the series represents. Variations exist in the punctuation of "ARBUCKLE'S" vs. "ARBUCKLES'". (See examples.)

These cards were also issued in an album format as "Arbuckles' Illustrated Atlas of the United States of America", available from the company as a mail-order premium, and "cards" cut from this album may sometimes be found. They are easily identifiable since the text on the back of the "card" doesn't match the illustration on the front. (BEWARE: These pieces of scrap are frequently offered for sale by unscrupulous dealers who choose to ignore their provenance and blithely attempt to pass them off as actual trade cards or, even worse, as rare "errors".)

A revised and expanded version of this series was released in 1915, 26 years after the original. It's listed here as State Maps - Reissue.