Post Cards From The Early 1900's

I survived my trip to the big town of Fresno yesterday, but that story will have to wait until I process the pictures.  In the meantime, here are those holiday cards and post cards I told you about that Florence saved.  There are well over a hundred.

She was a saver that girl.  I don't have ANY cards hanging around.  I think we were long lost cousins of some sort.  Very long ago I was told a story about their family being related to my Grandfather who grew up on the Isle of Man, as did they.

They must have been fairly well off as they traveled a lot through Liverpool and around England with a couple trips to the U.S. as well.  Eventually they moved to Bakersfield California.  All of this was back in the very early 1900's when the only way of communicating was by post cards and letters.  Remember those?

Florence's mother Adelaide was a saver too.  Most of these cards were sent to her or ones she purchased while on vacation.  When Florence passed on and left everything to my father, I was rather surprised.  I never heard him talk about them, nor did they ever visit that I know of.

Luckily, I was able to salvage them from the trash can when we cleaned out Florence's house in Petaluma.  Here are four of probably 50 cards, mostly for Florence's wedding.  Even the cards from her wedding gifts are here.  I don't think they were married very long since there were just a couple of anniversary cards.

The post cards that her mother Adelaide saved are amazing.  Here's one from Bishop California, a tiny little town on the East side of the Sierras.  

Way back then families would go to studios and have their picture taken, then made into post cards to send to relatives.  Many just say how are you.  Many more say "just wanted to make sure you got home okay".  If you were visiting someone, formality stated you announce your arrival, also by post card.  Then there were weird ones like this!!  Click on the image to see it bigger.

As you can see, this one was mailed from Blackpool (England I assume) in 1909.  

Talk about racey ... there are several images like this that show a little leg ... definitely a no-no back then, but I suppose they ARE at the beach.

Meet Miss Daisy Jerome.  Seems to me this one is a little racey too.  I've no idea who Daisy is!!

This card says Miss Maud Allan as Salome.  Woohoo!!!  Of course there are also many cards with landscape images, mostly of the Isle of Man and England.  This one of Salome has a note on the back.

Dear Maud.   Just a line as promised.  Hope the voyage was O.K. and that you were a good girl.  Mind you meet me on Tuesday as usual as I shall be wondering how you are.  Yours sincerely, Maggie.  It was mailed in 1908.

This is one of those photographs made into a post card.  This is Adelaide's sister Katie who would be visiting right after Christmas.  It's funny she writes on the back "please don't turn over in case I speak".  I think there were maybe eight or nine siblings in this family, all born in the 1880's.

Everywhere they went on vacation, Adelaide bought packages of post cards to send to friends and to remember her visit.  Camera's were not readily available.  I have many from San Francisco, the Redwood Highway, Medford Oregon, clear on up to Vancouver.  There's some from Oakland, Susanville, Fort Brag and the Riverside Auto Camp.  Just too many to name.

The B C Electric Railway Observation car from 1927 was conducted by Teddy Lyons and one visitor came to see Adelaide on the Mauritania.  Fascinating stuff.  When you think about it, most all of these cards are over 110 years old.

So if anyone has any ideas what I might do with all this history, let me know.  I would surely like to see it saved and not end up in another trash can.

In the meantime, aren't you glad you are not traveling to Yosemite National Park and in need of fuel?    Yup ... $6.07 a gallon for diesel.  That would be $303 to fill up my truck ... $500 for my rig.  Down in the valley it's not much better at $3.90.  You can tell summer travel is on the horizon by the price of fuel.

It's going to be a quiet day on the couch.  My poor Cooper has apparently hurt his back again ... a little too rambunctious with the ball game I suspect.  He will be sad because I'm throwing them all away!!  

Tomorrow ... the original underground house in California.