A collection of postcards, all over 100 years old, has been handed down to me. I have no idea how many people's hands the collection passed through in the century since they were sent, but somehow they stayed together. To my knowledge, no one looked at them very closely. As the keeper of the family archives, I was the most recent curator.
I had the bundle of cards for some years before I finally put them into a photo album with clear pages, so you could see both sides.. I tossed the album into my truck, where it rode around for a few weeks, until I gave a friend a ride, and asked him whether he would like to see something interesting. I showed him the album.
He flipped out. He had to inspect them closely, and he took the album home for a couple of weeks.
When he returned it, I took a closer look, and he was right, it's an amazing collection. I scanned them all. The scans are much better than the originals when it comes to inspecting them, they can be blown up for closer looks at the pictures, the postmarks and the stamps. And of course the scans can be made available to others.
The collection was compiled by a woman named Maggie Newbrough. She apparently lived at the same address as my father's uncle and family, and she collected postcards. Another uncle traveled the world, and sent postcards from everywhere he landed for Maggie's collection. As it happened, he landed in some amazing places, and he was interested in what there was to be seen. Among the places he visited were Japan, China, the Philippines, Java, Borneo, Ceylon, India, Egypt, and all of Europe.
I find the messages and postmarks as interesting as the cards themselves. Ed Hilf visited exotic places, and somehow the cards found their way to Cincinnati. He wrote in a beautiful hand, flowing script that no one uses today.
Before 1907 one side of the postcard was strictly for the address, so the messages are written on the side with the photo. After that year messages could be written on the address side.
One postcard was sent from China on April 18, 1906, the same day as the San Francisco earthquake. Because of the International Dateline, it was actually April 17 in San Francisco. The letter mailed the next day is postmarked at just about the same time as the temblor, April 19 in China. Both are postmarked May 24, 1906 in San Francisco, five weeks after the quake.
I have put the entire collection into a Flicker album. Please enjoy responsibly.