In the early 1920s the Haig Fund started selling poppys to raise money for ex-servicemen. The majority of the poppys sold were made of wire and silk and sold for 1/- and upwards. An alternative poppy was available however for school children who could not be expected to pay a full shilling for a poppy. These were made of cardboard and sold for a penny each. They were printed in red, with green centres and had a small tab at the top for the pin to go through:

It is believed that this pattern of poppy dates to 1923 or 1924. In October 1924 the Coventry Evening Telegraph reported that 5,387,375 children’s card poppys had been manufactured for sale. The back of this simple poppy is printed with details of the Haig Fund:

Assuming that all the poppys manufactured were sold for 1d each, the batch in 1924 would have raised £22,447 4/-. for the fund, a very significant amount of money in 1924. This is an incredibly rare survivor as most of these simple card poppys would be discarded after Armistice Day. This photograph of poppy sellers in 1923 is a scene that will be familiar even today: