Postcards: Creating and Tracing Histories

Postcards are among the top three things that people collect worldwide. Deltiology refers to the hobby of collecting postcards, and again it is one popular hobby that shares its prestige along with coin and stamp collecting. It owes its popularity to the wide range of themes and subject matters that it depicts.

The idea or invention of the postcard actually came from Dr. Emanuel Herrmann back in 1869. But it was only during 1893 when the first postcards were sold as souvenirs.

Postcards served as one of the most affordable and convenient means of communication. They became treasured and cherished collectible items at the same, providing travelers a means to preserve their journeys and take it home with them.

Postcards in History

According to experts, the direct ancestor of the postcard may be the envelopes when these printed articles were produced by D. William Unready, E.R.W. Hume, Dickey Doyle, and James Valentine. These envelopes were printed with comics or themes of Valentines and music. During the Civil War, images that evoked feelings of patriotism replaced these fun and quirky images. These are now called Patriotic Covers.

A regularly printed postcard had appeared in 1870. An advertising postcard, on one hand, came a year later in Great Britain. The postcard came to Germany in 1874 and postcards of the Eiffel Tower were printed in 1889 to 1890 and had created quite a stir. The first multi-colored postcard was produced during this time, specifically in 1889.

This same decade, the government of the United States had exclusively handled the production of postcards. However, on the 19th of May in 1898, a congressional agreement was reached, allowing private sectors to produce postcards. These were called Private Mailing Cards and had a more diverse collection of images printed on them.

Ironically, it was not until 1901 that the term postcard was officially used. And back then, postcards had an undivided back where both the address of the recipient and the note were written together. However, the “divided back” was introduced and was permitted in England in 1902, France in 1904, Germany in 1905 and the US in 1907. With this divided back, the left side is used for the messages and the right side for the address.

Millions of postcards were sold and sent during this time. Scholars coined this period as the Golden Age of the Postcard. However, as popular as the postcard was back then, it had quickly declined due to political turmoil.

Kinds of Postcards

The rapid growing and improvement of technology allowed postcards to be printed on linen in 1930. This gave the postcard a bit more of texture and it allowed the use of more brightly-colored dyes. The cost of production of these linen postcards is also very low. These linen postcards, because of their bright colors, have become the favorite advertising tool of roadside establishments.

In 1939, the photochrome postcards appeared. These are the high-quality colored postcards with extremely bright colors. They still remain to this day as the favorite of collectors and other postcard enthusiasts.

Aside from the photochrome postcards, there are other types of postcards that remain as some of the favorites by both collectors and publishers. These are:

1. View postcards are one of the most common types available in the market. These feature a landscape or a seascape of a town or a city.

2. Another type is the greeting card. This type of postcard is most popular during special holidays like Christmas, New Year and others.

3. Historical postcards, on one hand, usually depict social problems.

4. Another notable type is the art postcards, which are like miniature artworks and paintings of different artists.

5. Lastly, there are the photographic cards which feature real photos of people. These postcards, although short and small, make memories more tangible and long-lasting.

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