Real Photo Postcard with AZO stamp box (all four triangles pointing up) addressed to  “Miss Frances Cruser.  Neshanic Stas. NJ.”  The town name was confirmed after finding a Frances M. Cruser on the 1900 Federal Census taken in Branchburg, Somerset, New Jersey, and finding Neshanic Station on the map in the Branchburg area. This census shows parents Henry and Fredrika Cruser, born in Germany, Henry’s occupation is railroad worker; Frances M., single, born New Jersey, April 1878, occupation dressmaker; and Frances’ younger siblings Anna B., Henry Elmer and Lilly A. Cruser. The 1930 census shows Frances, married name Wilson, living with father, Henry in Branchburg. Frances’ spouse is not on this census, and it lists her age at first marriage as 30. If the census is correct then she would have married in about 1909, so taking this and the AZO stamp box into consideration, and the fact that it’s a divided back, we could approximately date this photo from about 1907 – 1909.

The message from the sender is a mystery though:  They wrote,  “this was taken in Peanut town”  but the next line is difficult to understand and also has crossed out words.  “All have a look the faint”  is my best guess at this point, which makes no sense whatsoever. (The photo is faint? The women feel faint? Good grief, this is a puzzle!)

The photo is great though, and shows an older woman, perhaps in her late 60s to early 80s. She must be sitting on a chair, as next to her, sitting on the sidewalk, is a very pretty young dark-haired woman. They both appear to be wearing wedding rings. One gets the impression that they are perhaps grandmother and granddaughter. The older woman wears a brooch, and the younger wears what may be a religious medal – if you look very closely, you can see the image of a figure, maybe a saint. The sidewalk they are posing on slopes up to our left, and the curb is fairly high. Behind them is a building or wall in stone with a wooden fence above it. The road showing at the bottom of the photo looks pretty rustic, a dirt road with lots of stones. A weed, perhaps plantain, is growing at the base of the curb, and it looks like a piece of paper with some large writing on it, perhaps a scrap of advertising, is at the bottom of the photo. The angle and the fact that the photo is faded at the bottom make the word too hard to read. (Drat!)

As to “Peanut Town” there is more than one possibility:  Of several nicknames for Allentown, PA, one of them is “Peanut City.” Another possibility is Suffolk, VA, officially called the “Peanut Capital of the World.” Both of these places show old early 1900 journal articles found online citing “Peanut Town.” Dothan, AL is also known as or self-proclaimed as the “Peanut Capital of the World.” Dothan has over 60 4-foot tall peanut characters around town – very cute! So anyway, it would be hard to pinpoint where this photo was taken. If betting, I would guess Allentown, PA. The Wiki article (listed below) on Pennsylvania city nicknames re “Peanut City” references peanut vendors lining Hamilton Street from the 1880s to the 1920s, singing jingles in Pennsylvania Dutch, and a personal account given in 1967, of a former newspaper editor, who had recalled that Saturday nights on Hamilton Street the boys and young men were out flirting with the girls and, “throwing the shells about with complete abandon”, so that the sidewalks the next morning were “not quite ankle deep”  with peanut shells.

Divided back, Real Photo Postcard, AZO stamp box with triangles pointing up. Unused with writing. Circa 1907 – 1909.

Price:  $15.00

Sources:  Year: 1900; Census Place: Branchburg, Somerset, New Jersey; Roll: 994; Page: 2A; Enumeration District: 0076; FHL microfilm: 1240994. (Ancestry.com)

Year: 1930; Census Place: Branchburg, Somerset, New Jersey; Roll: 1383; Page: 5B; Enumeration District: 0011; Image: 555.0; FHL microfilm: 2341118. (Ancestry.com)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_city_nicknames_in_Pennsylvania

Kriebel, H.W. (Ed.). (1912) The Penn Germania:  A Popular History of German History and Ideals in the United States, Vol. 13. p. 477. (Google eBook)

Jacobs, H.L. “How the Question is Being Settled at Suffolk, Va.” The Clay-Worker, Vol 45-46. T. A. Randall & Co. (1906) p. 844.

http://dothandestinations.com/Attractions.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Suffolk,_Virginia