Grace chose the name 'Rook', and with the addition of a ' Rook' card (serving as the Joker) the 57-card deck took its final shape. With this new fifty-six-card deck, whist and most other common card games could be faithfully played. The hearts, spades, clubs, and diamonds were replaced with ' suits' of colors: red, yellow, green, and black.
They replaced the Ace with a '1' and the jack, queen, and king with '11', '12', and '13' cards, and added a '14' card as well. To accomplish this, George and Grace recast the standard deck of playing cards. Parker and his wife Grace sought to create a deck of cards that could be marketed to people with religious objections to the standard deck. Sometimes referred to as Christian cards or missionary cards, Rook playing cards were introduced by Parker Brothers in 1906 to provide an alternative to standard playing cards for those in the Puritan tradition, and those in Mennonite culture who considered the face cards in a regular deck inappropriate because of their association with gambling and cartomancy. Rook is a trick-taking game, usually played with a specialized deck of cards.
10 to 60 minutes per round, Any number of rounds
