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Over the vigorous objections of the United
States Post Office on May 19, 1898 Congress
passed the Private Mailing Card Act allowing private printing companies to produce postcards.
Privately printed cards first
appeared in 1861 under an earlier act and the first card bearing images were copyrighted the same year.
The Post Office had been printing and selling official post cards since 1877 for a penny apiece, less than half
of the postage for a first class
letter. They had rapidly become popular with the poor and those who had quick
messages and no desire or expectation of privacy. One wag called
them “slow telegrams” comparing them
to another terse but far more expensive means of communication. They contributed to the explosion of Post Office business after the Civil War along with innovations
like direct business and home delivery in urban areas and railway mail
sorting which slashed delivery
times. Most official postcards were plain with a pre-printed stamp and space for an address on one side with the message written on the reverse. But the Post Office did offer a limited
number of decorated souvenir post cards with
engraved decorations on the address
side that were proving increasingly popular.
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| A late 19th Century official Post Office post card with decorative images. |
Private
companies were allowed to print
cards, but regular first class postage had to be affixed instead of the pre-printed post card rate, a powerful disincentive. The Post Office was loathe to forgo the advantage
this gave them and the growing stream of revenue. But printers—many
of whom were not so coincidently in
the newspaper business—got the ear of Republicans who were in firm
control of both Houses of Congress,
with their complaints of unfair government competition. The
Post Office never stood a chance. President William McKinley signed the
Act into law.
There were restrictions. The private
printers could not use the words post card or postal card. Instead they
had to clearly identify their product with the words Private Mailing Card Messages were not allowed on the address side
of the private mailing cards, as indicated by the words “This side is exclusively for the Address,” or slight variations of
this phrase. If the front had an image, then a space was left for a message.
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| A Private Mailing Card authorized by Congress. |
The Post Office must have discovered
that there was no revenue loss from selling stamps for private cards over their
own cards with printed postage because after four years in 1901the Post Master General Charles Emory Smith voluntarily
loosened regulations and allowed printers
to use the words Post Card instead of Private Mailing Card and dropped
requirement for a fine-print explanation
that they were produced under the Private Mailing Card Act. At the time the sales of souvenir post cards
with photos taking up the entire
front of the card was booming. But that eliminated the space for a message
and the Post Office still did not allow anything other than address info on the
back. That rendered these types of cards
of zero use for conveying any
message other than the implied, “Hey, look where I am.”
It wasn’t until the Universal Postal Union which governed international mail cards produced by
governments could have messages on
the left half of the address side in 1907.
Congress acted quickly to authorize private printers to do the same. It ushered in the period known as the Divided Back Era by collectors and set
off huge new demand. There was now space to scrawl “Wish you were
here” or “home on the 10 o’clock train next Friday” in the somewhat limited
space made available. Producers ramped
up production and images were
produced of landmarks in even the sleepiest rural hamlets, hence a glut of shots of muddy main streets, local churches, and Civil War monuments that can be found nearly by the bale at post card collector shows. The wide variety of images and the improving quality including bright color lithography by German companies for the American market meant this period is
also called the Golden Age of Post
Cards.
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| An example of the hyper-local post cards issued by small town printers--an early 20th Century view of the Woodstock, Illinois Presbyterian Church, one of a series featuring every church in town. |
That ended when World War I abruptly disrupted
the supply of German cards. Even the
best American technology could not
match the color printing quality of the European cards and interest in collecting post cards, which had become an extremely popular hobby declined, as
did sales. During the war American
printers produced cards with white
borders to save ink and were
sometimes faced with card stock
shortages. Most of the souvenir
cards of this period now included a short description of the front image on the
message half side of the back, reducing the available space for writing.
Novelty
cards with cartoons and funny sayings also became popular, some becoming iconic like the many versions of a gap-toothed hick kid with a cowlick
and the words “Me Worry?” which
eventually morphed into Alfred E. Newman
of Mad Magazine. Bathing
beauties and cars were other popular themes. Companies also produced Holiday cards for all occasions and advertising pieces.
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| The fore runner of Mad Magazine's Alfred E. Newman was featured on several novelty post cards |
Ordinary
folks could make their own post cards with the introduction of the Real Photo postcards produced using the
Kodak postcard camera. The postcard camera could take a picture and
then print a postcard-size negative
of the picture, complete with a divided
back and place for postage. These
could be sent in to Kodak which would print them on glossy photo stock like that used in Brownie snapshots. They were
also used by small town companies for the limited runs needed by the local pharmacy, hotel, or even funeral parlor. These became so popular other suppliers
entered the market, but Kodak continued to dominate this which continued
popular well in to the 1930s.
Commercial post cards got a huge
boost in 1931 when Curt Teich & Co. introduced
a new process of printing on high
quality rag count. These so-called linen cards had a rich texture and could hold brighter inks and dyes than
previous methods. The result was often almost painting like with highly saturated colors. Many were hand tinted from black and
white originals. These cards are now
highly prized by collectors.
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| A hand tinted linen post card of the Wyoming State Capitol building in my old home town of Cheyenne. I have a framed copy hanging in my home study. |
The linen cards dominated the market
until the introduction of photochrom
color postcards by Union Oil Co. for
sale at its Western gas stations in
1939. Printed on high glossy stock the public embraced the “more realistic” images
and they had almost completely replaced the linen cards by the early 1950s.
Post card remained popular through
most of the rest of the century. But the
introduction of e-mail, cheap digital cameras and eventually cell phones, and social media rendered post cards obsolete as a means of communication. All of the folks back home can now access
dozens of your personal photos,
including ubiquitous selfies
instantly instead of getting a single post card two days after you already got
home.
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| A contemporary stock glossy print souvenir post card. |
As sales shrank, so did the number
of companies producing cards and the images available. Virtually gone now are almost all hyper-local
cards. Each major city or tourist
attraction now is represented by a very limited number of stock cards which are harder and harder
to find. They are gone now from most gas
stations, restaurant and hotel racks, drug stores, and are even
harder to find at souvenir stands and
air ports. Those that are sold are packed in the luggage as cheap souvenirs and seldom mailed. After all, it costs 35 cents to mail a
post card now and almost no one has the right
stamp so those that are mailed usually have a regular First Class stamp
pasted on them.
Oh, and almost no one collects new ones anymore.
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