Andrew Simpson: Postcards

Showing posts with label Postcards. Show all posts

Tuesday, 5 August 2025

In praise of the humble picture postcard …….

It’s that time of year when stories of holidays would fall through the letter box onto the door mat.

Fishing boats, houses and a sea wall, Mousehole,2025

And leaving aside the saucy cards of inebriated vicars, busty women, and innocent shop girls, the postal service was full of picture postcards with scenes of seaside resorts and city centres.

The golden age ended I suppose in the 1960s, and pretty much has been seen off by pictures sent instantly by mobile phones at no cost.

By contrast sending an old-fashioned picture card today will cost 87 pence along with the price of the card and take days to arrive, and even longer if sent from some holiday destination in Greece.

A century and a bit ago a stamp cost next to nothing and with frequent collections and deliveries it was possible to tell your mum you were leaving on the morning train and be home by teatime.

Twisty street leading nowhere, Mousehole, 2025

Better still you could post early and arrange to meet up later in the day.

Now all of this I have written about heaps of time supported by a collection of picture postcards from the 1880s onwards.

So instead, here are four pictures I took last week, and with the help of technology tried to reproduce that golden mellow look that many picture cards seemed to have in the 1950s and 60s along with those blue tinged ones.

I even tried the really yellow look reminiscent of Eastman colour, but that was a step too far.

Of course, I could have gone for that washed out appearance which I suspect had more to do with the length of the time the cards had sat on those twirling stands in full view of direct sunlight.

And in keeping with the time, the selection ranges from the harbour scene and twisty street to the boring.

Leaving me just to offer up some from the collection spanning the Golden Age of the picture postcard which are available by following the link.*

The boring picture, Bristol, 2025

Two bikes and a heap of boats, Mousehole, 2025

Location; Mousehole, Cornwall, and Bristol

Pictures; Capturing Mousehole and Bristol, 2025, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Picture postcards, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search/label/Postcards

Monday, 23 June 2025

Chorlton Conservative Club and that post card from Spain nu 2 ........... a new mystery

Now it is odd just how stories come about.

Yesterday a new friend in Spain sent me a post card addressed to "Miss M Calderbank, Chorlton Conser, Club, Wilbraham Road, Chorlton. C. Hardy, England."

There was no date and I doubted that I would ever know who Miss M Calderbank was, or how the postcard got back to Spain.

But within an hour of posting the story Annette, Della and Marie all replied with memories of Melody Calderbank. Annette went to Levenshulme High School with Melody, Della remembered her parents Dick and Mona and Marie told me she would now be in her fifties which might date the postcard to around 1974.

But the best was that Melody's sister was also in touch commenting that "my sister is 66 now...... I'm 56...she married in 1972 when she left the Conservative Club...so post card could be older..."

Of course that just led to the mystery of how the picture postcard from Chris to Melody having arrived in Chorlton made its way back to Spain.

The answer is a bit more sinister and suggests that Miss M never got the card. Emma who sent me the card wrote that, “la postcard was rescued with another hundred , more or less , of a factory that recycled papel. todas rescued postcards have ornaments with pictures of Gypsy dancing sewn , so I think someone post , many years ago stole to coleccion.hay postcards to many parts of the mundo.I try to arrive but that some difficult. Que joy arrives.”

So perhaps Melody never got to know of the holiday Chris had in Spain and in turn Chris may well have just mumbled something about the Spanish postal service.

All of which is a nice lesson i how even the most mundane events have a habit of offering up a story of how we live.

Today the message would have been sent as a text, or from anyone of a number of different social media platforms, included would have been a photograph of the beach and perhaps even a selfie.

It would have been instant unlike our postcard which even in the 1980s would probably have arrived long after the suntan had begun to fade.

And the same social media platform allowed Emma to find me and pass on the postcard which perhaps 47 years later will allow Melody to be reunited with the postcard from Chris and along the way has given me a new friend from Spain who I might add has a better command of English than I of Spanish.

Location; Chorlton & Spain

Painting; The Conservative Club © 2012 Peter Topping

Web: www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk

Picture; the postcard, date unknown, courtesy of Emma Gilarranz Gutierrez

Sunday, 22 June 2025

A Chorlton mystery under a Spanish sun

Now I have no idea who Mel is or was or when she received this postcard from Chris, but it’s an intriguing little mystery.

I am sure someone will know of Miss M Calderbank who either worked, or lived at the Chorlton Conservative Club.

And maybe even the surname of Chris who confided that “the sea is far to rough for the boat.”

What makes the postcard just that bit more interesting is that it was sent to me by Emma in Spain, which begs the question, of why was it not posted?

Or if it was how did it end up back in Spain?

All very intriguing and within the hour Annette, Della and Marie all replied with memories of Melody Calderbank. Anntte went to Levenshulme High School with Melody, Della remembered her parents Dick and Mona and Marie told me she would now be in her fifties which might date the postcard to around 1974.

But the best is that Melody's sister has also been in touch commenting that "my sister is 66 now...I'm 56...she married in 1972 when she left the Conservative Club...so post card could be older..."

So not bad as a start and more to come.

Location; Chorlton & Spain

Picture; the postcard, date unknown, courtesy of Emma Gilarranz Gutierrez

Saturday, 14 December 2024

A little bit of gentle humour in 1903

Now I thought about digging out a Victorian Christmas card given the date, but I have done those already in the past and anyway Christmas is pretty much covered where ever you look, so instead here is a gentle bit of fun.

It dates from around 1903 and was sold not only here in Britain but also in the U.S.A, and Canada.

And before I upset Karl who delievers our mail I shall just reiterate that the Post Office has never let us down.

Picture; URGENT, BY SPECIAL MESSENGER from the series, comic sketches, marketed by Tuck and sons, 1903, courtesy of Tuck DB, http://tuckdb.org/

Friday, 29 September 2023

Deltiology …..... another story from Tony Goulding

I have recently become increasingly aware of just how much History can be revealed by the collection and studying of postcards otherwise, “deltiology”.(1)

Two postcards of East London of the Edwardian era

Margate Sands Great Yarmouth Pier

The advance of literacy, a low cost and reliable postal service, with multiple collections and deliveries daily, combined with the yet very limited use of telephones led to the Edwardian era being the heyday of postcard sending

A collection of correspondence of this era between two or more addresses can reveal intimate minutiae of a family’s life.

A card recently received from a friend on holiday in Ireland

A second great source of postcards are those sent from seaside resorts and other holiday destinations.,

These “wish you here” type postcards began in 1894 after a change in Post Office Regulations, increased with the greater availability of leisure time and continue even in this day of E-mails and text messages.

Other than some bills and “junk” mail, postcards are the only mail I receive regularly apart from Christmas.

A sub-genre of these “seaside” cards are the saucy postcards produced in their millions from the early 1930s.

It is interesting how these cards reflect social mores.

Increasingly popular from the 1930s until changes in attitudes to sexual stereotyping in the 1970s led to their decline. Sales of this type of card dipped significantly during the early 1950s.

Two Donald McGill “Saucy” postcards.

Several local councils, notably Cleethorpes in Lincolnshire, (2) deemed some of the cards obscene, seized them and had them destroyed.

Encouraged by the government of the day who were concerned about declining standards, Donald McGill, a leading designer with over 12,000 card designs was prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act (1857).

After a trial in Lincoln in1954, he was found guilty and fined £50 with £25 costs. This resulted in a purge of these cards nationally.

The 1857 Act was repealed and replaced in 1959 by a more liberal one with Donald McGill giving evidence before the House of Commons Select Committee charged with forming proposals for the new legislation. This and the advent of the “swinging sixties” led to a resurgence in the “saucy” cards.

“Paddy The Next Best Thing”, 1924

Postcards have also a long history of being used as a mode of advertising. Here is a typical example from the 1920s with The County Theatre, Reading, advertising the forthcoming production: “Paddy The Next Best Thing” week commencing Monday 11th February 1924 (3)

Hotels and restaurants have even offered to pay for the postage on such advertising cards.

The reverse side of postcards can also be of historical interest. Here are a couple of informative squares I have found recently in the "stamp" corner of two cards.

The U.S. Postage rates are of particular interest in that this is surely dated before the Cuban Revolution of 1st January 1959 after which relations between the United States and Cuba remained strained for more than five decades.

Finally, in closing this look at postcards it would be remiss of me not to give a nod to my maternal grandfather Arthur Harold Clarke who as a professional photographer during the inter-war years made his living by producing a series of Picture Postcards of the Chorlton-cum-Hardy area, examples of which regularly appear on this Blog.

Pictures; All from the collection of Tony Goulding.

Notes: -

1) “Deltiology” derived from the Greek words “deliton” meaning a small, illustrated tablet or card and “logos” meaning a word, speech, discourse, or reason.

2) There is a full report of this case in the Grimsby Daily Telegraph of 12th December 1951.

3) Details from the Reading Standard, Saturday 9th February edition.

Thursday, 20 July 2023

Making a new story ..... when the old one didn't work

There is always a story ….. even when the one you planned turns out to be a dead end.

And so it is with this picture postcard, which appeared to be about Teynham in Dorset.

It often pops up in popular history as the “lost village where time stopped in 1943” because “it was evacuated in December of that year ….. and has been deserted ever since. The area was needed for military training but after the war ended, the villagers were not allowed to return. The Village remains part of the Armoured Fighting Vehicles Gunnery School, an important training establishment of the British Army.*

It would have made a compelling story, only our card was destined for another village called Tyneham in Kent not Dorset.

Which meant that the story became the story of the Stickles family and how you go about dating a picture postcard.

The Stickles were living on Station Road Tyneham in 1911 and were still there in 1939.

Just when Mrs Stickles received her post card is as yet unclear, the post mark is illegible but the half penny green stamp of George V stamp dates from 1912 and 1924.

That said the picture postcard is older. It was produced by the Valentine company and their catalogue shows it was registered in 1895.

In time I will go looking for the history of the family, tracking them back and forwards across Kent.

Mr. Stickles worked as a labourer in a brick works and Mr. Stickles and his wife Emma had been married for 31 years, had had ten children, of which nine had survived and in 1911 three were stll living at home.

At this point I could comment on the contents of the card but I shall leave that to you to read.

Location; Kent

Picture; postcard circa 1912-1924 from the collection of David Harrop

*Visit Dorset, https://www.visit-dorset.com/listing/tyneham-village/13633301/

Friday, 23 June 2023

This year we will holiday at home

Now here is one I couldn’t resist.

And for all of us who have at times pondered on saving the holiday money and staying at home our friend on the deck chair with fan, fish and paddling pool might just have hit on something.

Picture, “WITH A LITTLE IMAGINATION YOU CAN TAKE YOUR SEASIDE HOLIDAY AT HOME, from the series, Economy Hints, date unknown, by Tuck and sons, courtesy of Tuck DB, http://tuckdb.org/