Monthly Archives: July 2014

John Arquero, Tourguide, Hilo, Hawaii

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Divided back, Real Photo Postcard, unused with writing. Circa early 1950’s.

Price:  $10.00

Real Photo Postcard in black and white, signed by Hawaii tour guide, John Arquero. He is shown wearing an example of a traditional costume worn by Hawaiian male royalty. He wrote,  “Your Guide, King Aloha John Arquero Tour, Hilo Hawaii”  and is majestically posed holding an upright spear, wearing a long cape, and the type of headgear called mahiole.

According to The British Museum website,  “Helmets, known as mahiole, were constructed of the aerial roots of the ‘ie’ie vine, woven into a basketry frame. They were perfectly fitted to an individual, and protected the most sacred part of the body, the head. All of a chief’s garments were considered tapu, having a divine or sacred power, and would not be worn by anyone else.”

The helmet and cape were traditionally covered in feathers:  red-orange from the ‘i’iwi bird, a species of Hawaiian honeycreeper, and black and yellow from the oo’s and the kioea. The two latter being the common Hawaiian names for two (sadly now distinct) species, that were once previously misclassified as honeyeaters.

Sources:  The British Museum. “Hawaiian feather helmut.” Web accessed 17 Jul 2014. [http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/aoa/f/hawaiian_feathered_helmet.aspx]

Wikipedia. ʻIʻiwi. Web accessed Jul 17 2014. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%CA%BBI%CA%BBiwi]

Smithsonian. “Hawaii’s Bird Family Tree Rearranged.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 16 December 2008. Web accessed 18 Jul 2014 [www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081211121827.htm]

Hawaii’s Flag

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Divided back, unused postcard. Photographer:  Stewart Fern. Mirro-Krome Card by H. S. Crocker, Inc., San Francisco. S-78. Nani Li’i Natural Color Card. Publisher:  Ray Helbig’s Hawaiian Service, P. O. Box 2835, Honolulu 3, Hawaii. Reg. 1951, Hawaii, U.S.A.

Price:  $5.00

From the prior post re the 49th state we travel now to the 50th state, and this posting will be the start of a short visit to Hawaii. The caption for this postcard shows:

“Hawaii’s Flag…once monarchy standard, a combination of America’s Stripes, England’s Union Jack, and French Tri-color. This fine specimen found in the Bishop Museum, Honolulu.”

Vintage Alaska Tourist Photos

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This gallery contains 6 photos.

Price for the set:  $15.00  Size for each photo:  3 and 1/2 x 2 and 1/2″ Here is a wonderful collection of vintage black and white photos, (in very good condition except for the top two which have some major … Continue reading →

Scenes On The Blue River, Kansas City, Missouri

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Divided back, unused postcard. Publisher:  The Elite Post Card Co., Kansas City, MO. Made in the U.S.A. Number/Series:  127  A-16656. Circa 1908 – 1914.

Price:  $8.00

Another Art Nouveau style postcard from The Elite Post Card Co. of Kansas City, MO. This one shows three tinted photo scenes of the Blue River, Canoeing, and “Camp.” The website Blueriver.org describes the river as “a wonderful little stream located on the south side of the Kansas City metro area”  and goes on to give a fuller account of it’s location. (I do adore this description which for me gives the river a cognizant – and rightly so – quality.) There is just something so compelling, mysterious, poetic and sacred about a river.

Source:  http://www.blueriver.org/

Views On Indian Creek, Dallas, Missouri

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Divided back, unused postcard. Publisher:  The Elite Post Card Co., Kansas City, Missouri. Made in the U.S.A.  Number/series:  157.  A-16684. Circa 1908 – 1914.

Price:  $8.00

“Views On Indian Creek, Dallas, near Kansas City, MO.”

Beautiful postcard with Art Nouveau lines and what appears to be tinted photos of three views near Kansas City, Missouri of:  Indian Creek, the bridge over Indian Creek, and Watkin’s Mill, built 1833.

Watkin’s Woolen Mill is a National Historic Landmark and a National Mechanical Engineering Landmark. The Missouri State Parks website explains that this woolen mill was the only one of 2,400 textile mills in 1870, that still contained it’s original machinery and equipment.

The publisher for this one (and the following post) is the Elite Post Card Company of Kansas City, Missouri. According to the Metropolitan Postcard Club of New York City, this publisher did views of the Midwest, and operated from about 1908 – 1914. They may have been having some struggles or started winding down by 1912 though, as a September 1, 1912 publication gives a short newsworthy note that the company was “petitioned into bankruptcy.”

Sources:  http://mostateparks.com/page/55172/parkhistoric-site-plans

http://www.metropostcard.com/publisherse.html

The Bookseller, Newsdealer and Stationer, Vol. 37. New York, September 1, 1912. p. 160. Web. (Google eBooks)

From A Sister Of Yours

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Divided back, unused, embossed postcard. Publisher unknown. Circa 1908

Price:  $20.00

Here’s a wonderfully unusual one:  A postcard with a cropped photo attached to it! The card shows a likeness of a pink rose and bud with the stems holding an unfurled piece of birch bark which bears the inscription  “With Best Thoughts.”  Underneath these well wishes, the sender has glued a charming photo of herself, and written,  “from A Sister of Yours.”  At the top corners she wrote,  “Oakland, Calif.”  and  “September 1, – ’08.”

The card is addressed to:  “Mrs. L. L. Collins, Iola, Kansas”  and signed,  “With Love.” 

Thankfully, for research purposes, the date and place of the card were given, if not the sender’s name. The addressee turns out to be Lydia Loretta (Pember) Collins, born Michigan, July 19, 1867, died Alameda (county or city) California, February 19, 1946; parents John Wesley Pember and Sarah Elizabeth Christie. The Iola, Kansas city directory for 1908, shows Lydia married to Louis L. Collins, occupation travel agent, with their residence at that time being 414 S. First St., Iola, KS. Later, on the 1910 census, Lydia and daughter Lucille are shown living with Lydia’s parents and some of the siblings in Oakland, CA.

The identity of the woman in the photo has to be either Goldie, Edith or Alice Pember. The 1910 Federal Census for Oakland, California shows the girls living with their parents and a brother James Lewis Pember. Goldie, Edith and Alice were all born in Kansas, and at the time the 1910 census was taken, Goldie was about 23, Edith about 22, and Alice about 19. The photo would have been from at least a couple of years earlier, so it could be more likely that it is of one of the older two girls. (Doesn’t she look like she might be in her early twenties rather than seventeen?)

Were we doing a family tree for the Pember and Collins families, we would have plenty to work with, and would be including records from locations in Ohio, Michigan, Kansas, California and Canada. (Interesting to note some moving back and forth between Kansas and California and to take note of Louis Collins’ seemingly unusual occupation, for that day and age, of travel agent – but this likely meant traveling salesman, as we see the term come up in pretty often in census records.) And per the census records, the full list of Pember children appears to be:  Lydia, Valentine, Charles, Miles, Mary, John, James Lewis, Goldie, Edith and Alice. The 1880 Federal Census for Jamestown, Michigan shows Mary, age three, and she could be the woman in this photo but this seems highly unlikely, as no other records were found on her. So, we’ll venture to go out on a little bit of a limb and state that here is either Goldie, Edith or Alice Pember! We hope the answer to which Pember sister this is will come to us at some future date.

Sources:  Year: 1880; Census Place: Jamestown, Ottawa, Michigan; Roll: 601; Family History Film: 1254601; Page: 559A; Enumeration District: 247; Image: 0319. (Ancestry.com)

R. L. Polk & Co.’s Iola City Directory including Gas And LaHarpe, 1908. p. 60. (Ancestry.com. U.S. City Directories, 1821-1989)

Year: 1910; Census Place: Oakland Ward 1, Alameda, California; Roll: T624_69; Page: 2A; Enumeration District: 0077; FHL microfilm: 1374082. (Ancestry.com)

California, Death Index, 1940-1997. Place: Alameda; Date: 19 Feb 1946. (Ancestry.com.)

Royal Avenue, Belfast, Ireland

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Undivided back, unused postcard. Publisher:  The Valentine Company. Circa 1901.

Price:  $4.00

Turn of the century image in pale aqua and black of Royal Avenue in Belfast. This is a photo that has appeared in several incarnations. Sepia toned or black and white, and some with a little more of the original photo showing. You can see how this one here is a little faded out at the bottom. But in any case, it’s a lovely spot to lose ourselves in for a moment or two. Those are horse-drawn double decker trolleys in the photo, and we can estimate the date of the card as circa 1901 for two reasons:  A similar “Valentine’s Series” card was found online of a Dublin view dated 1901 by the sender, and Great Britain did not allow divided back postcards till 1902.

 

Mother And Son RPPC

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Divided back, unused, Real Photo Postcard. PMC stamp box showing diamonds in all four corners. Circa 1907.

Price:  $15.00

Real Photo Postcard (RPPC) showing a studio portrait of a beautiful young mother and her adorable, approximately three year old son. They are both fashionably attired. The little boy, who has blond curls, wears a sailor suit, belted romper-type outfit with a large bow. The mother wears a dress, or it may be a matching skirt and blouse, in a dark material with a squarish neckline, trimmed in matching braid, and a white insert with a double row of dark braid on the high-necked collar. The bodice shows a double row of buttons which continue onto the skirt and flare out to the sides. The woman wears a chain with a round pendant, and a bracelet over the right sleeve of her long sleeved blouse, but one of the most striking things about her ensemble is the Breton style hat. The description found on the excellent Shappos blog under types of hats for the Breton or Bretone is a “women’s hat with ample round crown and brim turned up all around.”

This postcard’s date is estimated at 1907. The stamp box shows PMC with diamonds at each corner, which is a design that is at least from 1907, according to the stamp box examples on the excellent playle.com website. There does not seem to be much known about the company that produced this type of “printing out” paper for Real Photo Postcards. Playle.com shows six different PMC designs ranging from approximately pre-1907 to 1915, and shows a known year for the design we have here of 1907. You may have to take a closer look at the letters in the stamp box, as at first glance they may look like PMO.

Lastly, when viewing photos we sometimes have strong impressions about a person’s nationality (and wonder a little about the political correctness of saying someone “looks” like they are from a certain country) but for me I’m thinking immediately of Ireland when looking at this woman’s photo.

Sources:  http://www.shappos.com/blogs/how-to/9021445-hat-terminology

http://www.playle.com/realphoto/photop.php

A Hearty Greeting

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Divided back, used postcard. Postmarked June 17, 1912, Arapahoe, Nebraska. Publisher unknown – possibly John Winsch.

Price:  $4.00

“June 17, 1912. Dear Cousin Lena. I got your letter saturday. I was away sewing all week. I will be looking for a card most any day to say you are coming. They are going to celebrate the fourth at Gosper. you must be here for that. we will meet you when you come down at the depot. well good by hoping to see you soon   Ellen.”

Addressed to  “Miss Lena Davis, Almena Kans. R. R. #3.”

Another in our collection for Lena. A nice colorful country scene of a couple greeting a neighbor at sunset. The scene is inside an outline of a four-leaf clover and to the right is a small bunch of probably forget-me-nots. The background is unusual in a stone-type gray pattern, and the caption is  “A Hearty Greeting.” This card was postmarked in Arapahoe, Nebraska, but I’m not sure what the stamp above the barely discernible month of June is. Looks like it’s “GPM” but I’m not finding any explanation for this acronym.

There is no stated publisher info on this postcard but the header design was used by publisher John Winsch according to many other sites, and postcards that are showing up online with his info on the front of the card. But it could have been a design that more than one publisher used.

Art Nouveau Violets

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Divided back, embossed postcard. Postmarked March 20, 1915. Publisher:  E. Nash. Series or number L-11.

Price:  $10.00

“Greeting you with friendship so warm,

As to pierce the gloom of any storm.”

A stunning Art Nouveau style, embossed postcard showing violets, the above verse, and an unusually “framed” rural rainy day scene, on a sort of pale peach background. The artist depicted a person up there on the path getting caught in the rain. But what about the part where the path crosses over the stream? It just sort of flows magically across the water. Anyway, this is one from the “Lena Davis Collection” and the sender wrote:

“Long Island. March 17. Dear Cousin. how are you. have a cold. how do you like the mud. Ralph went to the sale to day. Harrold[?] is coming home with him. have drove my colts once. did you have a good with Will. the boys are going to Norton tomorrow I guess. did you go Sunday School. guess Irvin Kickly is maried to day that is what I hear. I haven’t made up my mind to go to German yet. …….?…….As ever your Cousin J. K.”

J. K. sent this postcard from Long Island, Kansas. Norton and German are nearby towns. I’m not sure what town this says for Lena. It’s possible it’s a misspelling of Culver, as it looks like Calvert or Colvert which are not showing up as towns in Kansas. Also it’s hard to read the writing on the bottom left and side. Not sure what that says there. It’s interesting to take note of how much is going on in this sender’s message, what with his or her cold, the mud, the colts, Ralph, the boys, Irvin’s supposed marriage, the Sunday School question and the uncertainty of the trip to German, KS (!)