At the end of a long table at an estate sale sat a cardboard flat of 100s of picture postcards. Most came from the 1950s and 60s and had been stamped, addressed, and sent, leaving clues to the activities of one family’s life and friends. The cards carry brief reports on trips in the United States and internationally.
The original postcard owner joined a ham radio club while in college in Pennsylvania. He collected 70 QSL postcards acknowledging he had reached ham radio operators in nearby states on the Eastern Coast, Canada, California, Florida, Iowa, Nebraska, Maine, Arizona, Utah and the U.S. Naval Armory Reserve in Winston-Salem, Virginia. Those two years felt significant enough to the ham radio operator to keep his response cards for six decades. The collection of QSL postcards morphed into a postcard collection with the help of others. At the top of a foldout postcard a friend wrote, “you can add this to your collection.”
Postcards preceded today’s short Twitter messages. At least one messages seemed too short. What did the writer mean as they wrote from Paris, “Your telegram was received with great jubilation.” Jubilation over what? A new family member? A new job? House? The collection never reveals the secret. Readers can only speculate, as they do again with the sad note on a card from Helsinki describing another woman as “able to talk and can walk with much help. She is hoping for an operation to relive the pressure on the brain. She is not too good.” The post card reflects a time when those with serious problems, and enough funds, went to Europe for treatment by the best surgeons on that continent.
Most, however, went to Europe as tourists: From Scandinavia the writer says, it is “full of American tourists all trying to see as much as possible in a short time. We’re doing well in that game.” The tourists reported on their collection of souvenirs and memories, “We had two stops in Turkey then one more in Greece. I bought a mink coat in Rhodes, Greece.”
Then as now, international food provides memorable meals. From Brazil a friend wrote, “My pronunciation must be bad. I order steak and get cheese.” From Paris: “Wish you were here to ‘do’ the restaurants with me. I am getting fat!” And in 1956: “We had two weeks in Chili, Uruguay and Argentina. I’m in Buenos Aries: You should taste the steaks down here! For eight days I’ve had steak for every meal except breakfast. And they have cost only 40 to 90 cents each.”
Not every card reflects the traditional “having a wonderful time, wish you were here.” From Egypt a traveler wrote: “Egypt: King Tut! I’ve been to his tomb … too much disease and poverty and heat. Too many flies and mosquitoes in Egypt for my taste.” And on another card, “We rode camels and bought souvenirs from the pushy natives. They like small American dollars.”
A 1950 assortment of unused black and white picture cards of bullfights in Spain includes a card stating, “Mom keeps threatening to leave Spain, but I love this country!”
A 1984 card sent from London reflects a grandmother’s sense of humor. Two young men grin above a “Greetings from London.”The firsguy defies gravity with a towering Mohawk, the othes defies nature with tussled, tinted hair. “This reminds me of you last summer,” Grandma wrote to her grandson.
After the amusement of peeking at the past, the postcards returned to the box until a new owner comes along seeking amusement or to expand his vintage, postcard collection.