Word: carding
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1950-1959
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
CREDIT, which was once the sign that a person had trouble meeting his bills, has taken on a glamorous new meaning in recent years. Now a man with a credit card can rent a plane or boat or car, live it up in nightclubs, take a safari to Africa and even get a Kelly Girl for temporary office help. Why? Because of the Credit-Card Game, see BUSINESS...
...nation's expense-account economy, nobody is anybody unless he can say "Charge it." Thus, the credit card has risen as a new symbol of status that enables one to rent a plane or boat or car, give parties in nightclubs, even go on a full-blown safari in Africa without putting down a penny. For businessmen it also provides a convenient record of all expenses to show the Internal Revenue Service. Last week the credit-card game provided businessmen with the spectacle of being wooed and fought over by a handful of companies trying to dominate the business...
Full House. While oil companies, hotels and airlines started their own credit cards years ago, the fast-growing new market for a broad new type of card was pioneered in 1950 when Lawyer Ralph E. Schneider, 49, Hollywood and Broadway Producer Alfred Bloomingdale, 42, and the late Frank X. McNamara founded Diners' Club. They built up a roster of 17,000 restaurants, hotels, motels and specialty shops that were glad to pay them a 7% fee for the business of their 750,000 members...
Diners' had no serious competition until old, bold American Express three months ago dealt itself into the card game, enlisted the aid of its worldwide contacts to drum up members. Through banks, American Express mailed applications to 8,000,000 depositors-people who obviously have some money to spend. President Ralph T. Reed also sent personal letters to 22,000 corporation presidents. More than 300 American Expressmen started knocking on doors of executive suites all round the U.S. to sell the credit card (charge: $6 per year for initial card, $3 for other members of the same firm...
...CREDIT CARD for restaurants, shops, car rental, etc., round the world is planned by Hilton Hotels. Corporation already has 1,000,000 holders of credit cards used in Hilton's 33 hotels alone, last year did $60 million business with them...