A Visual History of Credit Cards

Caitlin McDevitt of Slate's The Big Money site has written a fun, brief history of the credit card, starting with a photo of the very first credit card, The Diners' Club from 1951. Frank McNamara, the founder of The Diners' Club, said he got the idea for the company while dining in a restaurant and realized he didn't have his wallet with him. (Of course, if he had left his wallet at home, then the credit card would be at home, too, but why let logic ruin a good story?)

Shown above: The Rolling Stone MasterCard from 1995. The image comes from The American Credit Card Collector's Society website.

I had no idea that credit cards were collectible. Maybe that Apple Computer credit card I've been saving since 1985 is worth a fortune!

You can learn all about credit cards and find out which one is right for you at Credit.com's credit cards section.

Mark Frauenfelder – Editor-in-chief of MAKE magazine and the founder of the popular Boing Boing weblog, Mark was an editor at Wired from 1993-1998 and is the founding editor of Wired Online.