Sunday, August 25, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Rudolph Dirks
The first time I ran one of these Moving Picture cards, which Hearst papers gave away in 1906, I asked readers to explain to me how the movement was supposed to happen, because I failed to get the concept. DBenson explained in great detail how the silly things were supposed to work, and now I get it ... I guess ... but colour me underwhelmed.
Mark Johnson also offered help, suggesting I take a look at one of his Ask The Archivist online columns which addressed this exact subject. Well, maybe that column was in its pristine state back in 2019, but today look at the poor thing! The images are gone, and the text, at least on my browser, is so faint as to be illegible. Hey King Features, get your act together and fix these superb columns by Mark Johnson! They're fading away before our very eyes!
Labels: Wish You Were Here
It is a real shame about my old blog. There's a lot that should be preserved, but perhaps KFS has no more use for it, and it's slowly being wished into the corn field. Or might be that it's still a valuable draw, (They said that while I was doing it, it had the largest following) and if one pays for their "Comics Kingdom" subscription, the pix and words would return.
Just can't find it now, but I had shown in at least one posting, a card from this series that was uncut, with careful instructions around the edges as to where to cut and fold to make the up-and-down action when squeezed. As you can imagine, the action is usually some Hearst hero receiving deserved or not lumps.
Sunday, August 18, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from R.F. Outcault
Here's an Outcault postcard from the J. Ottmann Company, published in 1905. My batting average on this card is a perfect .000. I don't get the gag at all -- is Company G a Thing of some sort, or ... ? And then, in the sender's message, what in the world is a "poultry wall", and why's she asking about it????
Labels: Wish You Were Here
What caught my eye is the use of white ink rather than just letting the paper stock show through instead. Looks really nice. Did they do that a lot back then? I don't recall.
Sunday, August 11, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Jim Davis
Here's a Garfield card, designated P7520, from Argus Communications. Published in the mid-80s, as if that were much of a mystery given the thought balloon. "Let's do lunch", that infamous Hollywood brush-off, was popularized in the mid-80s and became so ubiquitous we were all sick of it in no time. Did Jim Davis get his foot in the door while it was still a popular meme? Well, the postcard is unused, so....
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, August 04, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Cobb Shinn
Time to inflict on you another postcard by Cobb Shinn. Here's a case where the cartoon, for all its faults, has a recognizeable subject, but it just doesn't serve to bring home the gag that is alluded to by the caption. Cobb, oh Cobb, what are we going to do with you.
This one has no maker or copyright information, but it was postally used in 1911.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, July 28, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Grace Drayton
Here's a card for the traveller who is lonely and homesick. This is from Grace Drayton's long series for Reinthal & Newman, and this card is -- I think -- coded #249. Hard to tell as the first number is smudged on my card. The card was postally used in 1914 by a lonesome traveller, and I know it because it says so in the message on the back.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, July 21, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from August Hutaf
But more importantly, what's with this jarringly untraditional term 'straw-ride'? For goodness sake, how could Hutaf know the activity, but not know it is a hayride? Now I'll grant you, out in the midwest grain-growing belt, I suppose they might actually refer to it as a straw-ride, since they produce lots of straw there. But Hutaf was a New Jersey guy, and here on the east coast we're hay-makers. And yes, I refuse to explain the difference to you city slickers. Look it up yerself, fancy-pants.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
In hunting through old Post Cards, you may recall their trademark; a small Peacock with plumage spread into a circular shape, with words descending through the feathers to below the bird's feet," THE PCK SERIES".
Sunday, July 14, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Wallace Morgan
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, June 30, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Gene Carr
Here's a Gene Carr postcard, issued in 1907 by the Rotograph Company. Some cards of this series were topical cards for various holidays, but this one simply celebrates boyhood summertime fun. This card is designated 242/7 in practically invisible red ink at the lower left hand corner.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, June 23, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Harry Hershfield
Harry Hershfield did only one postcard series that I know of, and it featured his famous creation Abie the Agent. Each card offered a cartoon of Abie along with a gag using his trademark New York Jewish argot. For reasons unknown these cards are quite hard to find. Maybe because they fail to offer a copyright to International Feature Service?
The "Kabibble Kard"s were published by the Illustrated Postcard and Novelty Company of New York. The cards are undated, but based on the cartoon of Abie, I would definitely place them in the 1910s, as Abie's look changed a bit by the 1920s. This particular card is marked "658/2" whatever that means. Series 658 card 2 perhaps?
Labels: Wish You Were Here
It must have been painful for him to go around with a twisted foot like that.
Sunday, June 16, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Rose O'Neill
Here's another Rose O'Neill card, published by Gibson Art Company. As usual, no copyright dates on these cards. This one was postally used in 1922.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, June 09, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from John T. McCutcheon
Here is card #14 in the McCutcheon "A Boy In ..." series, which Eddie Campbell tells us totalled 32 different cards. Copyrights on these cards seem to refer to original appearances in newspapers, and this one apparently ran in 1905. The copyright on the reverse is 1906, and since they're all divided-back cards they were likely actually published in 1907 or later.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Henry's fat, but he doesn't have much else to do like Oliver Hardy.
If you see Ollie's earliest efforts, going back to the "Plump and Runt" and Billy West comedies in the 1910s, you will see that he had many of his unique mannerisms, like the fussy finger movements and the weary look to the viewer for sympathy even then.
I have answered Mr. Cairns privately.
Sunday, June 02, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Reg Manning
Here's a Reg Manning 'Travelcard', this one published in 1942 and designated #18. They were called Travelcards because there are fill-in-the-blanks on the reverse for the sender to enter the date and time and where they were at that moment on their journey. Manning's Travelcards were printed by Curteich out of Chicago, and distributed throughout the southwest by Lollesgard Specialty of Arizona.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, May 26, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Fred Opper
Here's another entry from the 'Li'l Arsonist' series of cards, given away free with Hearst papers in 1906. This one features Happy Hooligan and Montmorency in the big reveal. Don't know the details of the ignition properties of these cards, but the user who put the torch to this one managed to get the image of the two stars to appear on the back side of the card as well!
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, May 19, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Albert Carmichael
Carmichael produced a whole series of cards (Taylor Pratt & Company
Series 668 of 1910) based on the 1908 hit song "Has Anybody Here Seen Kelly?".In this case we only need but look up.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, May 12, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Walter Wellman
This is card #1022 in Walter Wellman's probably self-published series of cards from 1907. What young fellow, separated from his gal who is probably away with her family, wouldn't be thrilled to receive such a card. Nicely done Walter, who was not generally all that adept at drawing pretty girls. You nailed it! Sadly, this card was never posted -- an opportunity forever lost.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, May 05, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Nate Collier
Here is a Nate Collier card from Taylor Pratt's Series 892 (aka Red Border Series), published in 1912. It seems to me this card is a brilliant bit of marketing magic -- those who shun religion will buy it, knowing their recipient will understand they are being sarcastic. Those of a religious bent will also buy it for the opposite reason. Nice one Nate!
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, April 28, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Zim
Here's a postcard from Taylor Platt & Co.'s series 680. All the cards in this series had the same gagline, making poor Zim have to come up with cartoons to sorta fit. I'd say the fit leaves something to be desired on this example.
Thanks to Mark Johnson, who scanned this card from his collection.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, April 21, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Walter Wellman
Here's a 1909 card that was probably self-published by Walter Wellman. The gag somewhat depends on the postcard recipient being aware of an organization known as "The Black Hand", an old-timey name for what we now call the Mafia. The Black Hand was the subject of cartoon gags on a semi-frequent basis back in the early years of comics, so I was surprised to find I've only referred to it once before here on the blog, way back in 2009.
Thanks to Mark Johnson, who scanned this card from his collection.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, April 14, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from Dwig
Thanks to Mark Johnson, who scanned this card from his collection.
Labels: Wish You Were Here
Sunday, April 07, 2024
Wish You Were Here, from R.F. Outcault
Outcault produced many of these calendar advertising postcards, some for specific advertisers, like this one, some more generic.
The Rockford Watch Company was not a particularly major player in the pocket watch market, and the factory was shuttered just six years after this marketing campaign. Perhaps a victim of the newfangled wristwatches, I wonder?
These cards seem to have been produced with the idea that Rockford dealers would do the posting, but then you would think they would not be preprinted with "Dealers Name and Address Here" on them, but rather just an open space for the dealer's stamp. Bad planning, that.
Thanks to Mark Johnson, who provided the scans of this card.
Labels: Wish You Were Here