Postcards from the Summit

Love those diners……..

postcardsfromthesummit — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 00:45:50 +0000

Last time I talked about the Curt Teich Archives and their website. They also have an online store that you can click on and see a list of vintage reproduction postcards to order. I couldn’t resist ordering a few and am thrilled with them. I am including a couple or three here just for you to enjoy.

The one at the bottom is my favorite–isn’t it great?!!!! The Gator Diner was located at Central Avenue and 20th Street, St. Petersburg, FL, 1951. I love it!!!!

The next one up is also a diner–beginning to think I have a thing for diners. It’s the Boulevard Diner at 41st Street and Crescent Boulevard, Camden NJ, 1950. It obviously was the “in” place in Camden.

Finally, the one here at the top goes all the way back to 1911. On the front it reads (in case you can’t see it): Fifth Avenue on Sunday morning, New York City. Anyone who was anyone could be seen here on Sunday mornings. Remember the Easter Parade? “On the Avenue, Fifth Avenue…..” If you don’t remember the song, ask your grandmothers, they have at least heard it. LOL I got a few more postcards from the museum, maybe next time. Until then…..

Greetings from Akron, Ohio

postcardsfromthesummit — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 00:35:20 +0000

This is an example of a linen postcard, in use from about 1933 to the mid 1950′s. This card was postmarked December 18, 1942. Someone sometime somewhere along the way wrote “1942″ on the front of the card. I don’t much like that, but I guess it is part of the history of this particular postcard. It was manufactured by the Curt Teich Company of Chicago, which operated from 1898 to 1978 as the world’s largest printer of view and advertising postcards. Curt Otto Teich (1877-1974), an immigrant to the US from Germany (1896), founded the company. The company saved examples of every image printed, as well as company records and the original production materials for each postcard. This information comes from www.TeichArchives.org and the following is a direct quote from their website: “The Teich Archives consists of millions of images relating to 10,000 towns and cities primarily in the United States and Canada, but including more than 87 other foreign countries. More than 365,000 images are cataloged in the Archives, and 20,000 of these are available online at www.digitalpast.org.” “Greetings from Akron Ohio Rubber Manufacturing Center of the World” This is what made Akron a boom town in the teens of the 20th century. Rubber The big three rubber manufacturers had plants here–Goodrich, Goodyear and Firestone. Until my next post…

More Akron Cards

postcardsfromthesummit — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 16:02:24 +0000

Sandy Beach Park–A big part of my childhood! This card was mailed 4 Feb 1930–quite a while before my time. But, even 20-25 years later when I was swimming here in the 1950′s, the park looked pretty much the same. The big slide was gone, but the diving platform, or its great grandson, was still there. I lived about 1/2 mile south of here (behind the scene), and spent many summer days swimming and playing in the park. Of course, the park is long gone, torn down to make room for large, expensive lakeside homes. The 1950′s–don’t let anyone ever tell you that was an idyllic time–it wasn’t. It was a decade filled with racism, the House Un-American Activities Committee and the constant threat of nuclear war. But, for me, for a few brief years, it was a golden time of childhood, much of it spent right here at Sandy Beach Park.

Akron Postcards

postcardsfromthesummit — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 23:35:33 +0000

I told you I have collected many early Akron postcards over the years, and I thought you might like to see some of them. Akron was founded in 1825 on the banks of the Ohio and Erie Canal. It is on one of the high points in Ohio, and in 1835 Summit County was created with Akron as it’s county seat. Akron remained primarily a canal town until the railroads took over much of the shipping and passenger traffic in the 1880′s. Then we became a factory town, manufacturing ceramic tile, agricultural machines and then, rubber products, primarily tires. By 1908, the postmark date of the first postcard, we had a bustling town. You can see that in the downtown scene. My Grandmother was 7 years old when this postcard was mailed, and lived not too far north of this location. As she grew up over the next decade, Akron changed from a bustling town to a boom town. The population in 1910 was 69,000. By the time Gram married in 1921, the population had exploded to over 200,000. This is another view of downtown around this time . The skinny building there was the Flat Iron building, built in 1907. The postcard is unused, but dates from about 1912-1915. That building was still there when I was a child in the 1950′s, but was demolished in the early 60′s, I think.

I hop you’ve enjoyed seeing just a couple views of my home town. I’ll be posting more as I go along. I’ll also be adding some more modern postcrossing cards–views from around the world.

Until next time.

FirstPostcard

postcardsfromthesummit — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 02:26:27 +0000

I talked last time about the postcard that got me hooked. It was a simple Christmas postcard sent from one young woman to another. The receiver lived in Barnesville, Ohio which is about half-way between Cambridge, OH and St. Clairsville to the east. It looks to be a very small town, even today. So, this is the postcard. I know it looks very ordinary, but, at the time, it really grabbed me. And I have been a postcard fan ever since. I also think that postcards appeal to visual people. There is something just about the picture or the photograph that makes it a small work of art. That sounds simplistic, I know. But, true. We see the pc and think, “ooow, pretty picture, shiny” and we instinctively reach for it. lol Maybe it is just that simple. Until next time

Beginnings

postcardsfromthesummit — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 01:01:15 +0000

This is the first post of my first blog. A beginning. My interest in postcards began about 10 years ago. I was wandering through a flea market, just glancing at stuff with no real interest, when I started leafing through a box of old postcards. I came across a Christmas postcard written by a young woman. She had fastened a picture of herself to the card. I was suddenly touched by the very personal message she had written to a friend, and I felt connected to her across the years. The card was written 12/17/1908–100 years ago this December. I was hooked!

A few years later, I started researching my family. And discovered how much fun it was to find postcards from grandparent’s and great-grandparent’s home towns. To see pictures of places where they had lived when they had lived there. Streets and buildings which no longer exist. I collected quite a few old postcards relating to my family and to my home town–Akron, Ohio.

I still collect old postcards and some new ones. I have a particular interest in Halloween cards–both old and new. But, now I am more interested in sending and receiving cards from around the world. I guess it goes back to what attracted me to postcards in the first place–the connection we make to others over time and space.

So, I’m hoping to show some of the cards I’ve collected over the years and tell a little bit about the places they picture. But, I’m also going to include the cards I send and receive today and tomorrow. I always enjoyed geography when I was in school–but everything I learned then is “gone with the wind”. Postcards are tickets to a new world. Until my next post.