The Cadet was first added to the Crackajack line in 1905 just two years after their first models; The Professional, Senior and Junior, were sold by Allan & Co of Melbourne.
These Cadets had the same engraved fonts as F A Rauner’s Cracker Jack (the harp of world wide repute) as displayed in their 1915 Catalogue.
This also had the registered number 28285, which was all the evidence I needed in declaring F A Rauner as the Aussie Crackajack maker. If you like, the Cadet’s fancy curly wurly font is the icing on the cake.
Advertised as the smallest Crackajack, it probably measured just on three inches.
There were a few different styles of Crackajack Cadet’s over the journey. Harland’s cover plate with the tear drop edges (above/perhaps 1927), instead of the more familiar rounded end seen pictured below.
There was even one with standard font (pictured below) with rounded holes in a 1924 advertisement (possibly very shortly lived and thus very rare).
I was a hair breath away from securing (if the price was right) a Cadet back in Covid daze when my brother-in-law had spotted one in a CLOSED store window. See here My Baby.
Harmonica Riff Raff 