Laurel Cottage Genealogy
Genealogy Services, Old Photos, Postcards, Trade Cards, Etc.

Meadowlark

Posted on March 7th, 2014 by

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“San Diego, Cal. 5/25/11.  Bill, does this look like my bird? Not as good of course. Suppose your school has let out by now. You are too thick to learn anything anyway. Chet.”

Card addressed to:  Mr. Richard Edge. Healdsburg, Cal. RR #3.”

Beautiful postcard showing print of an unknown artist’s painting (or colored drawing?) of a meadowlark. This is probably one from a series of bird postcards.

Due to the teasing nature of Chet’s note to Bill, it would seem that Chet was possibly the older brother, and this was, indeed, confirmed by census records. (Why Richard is called Bill is unclear, it must have been either a nickname or perhaps William was Richard’s middle name.) Anyway, per the census records, Chester was born in Nebraska, about 1890, and Richard born in Oregon, about 1904. There was an older brother, Elton born Nebraska, about 1887. The parents of these three boys are George and Louise Edge. So, Chet was about twenty when he sent this postcard to his little brother Richard, who was about seven at the time. We wondered if Chet was in art school, due to the remark he makes in his note, but discovered that Chet enlisted in the U. S. Navy as a young man, and by 1930 he was retired (occupation listed as Retired Naval Officer on the 1930 census.) The 1910 census shows him (Yeoman, 3rd Class) on board U.S.S. Perry, along with 76 other men. (Location of the ship is not listed, with only the district given on the census as 0086, but we’ll skip the research on this, at this time.)

In searching for more info on U.S.S. Perry (D-11) we find that Perry was a Bainbridge Class Destroyer (one of the first Torpedo Boat Destroyers built by the U.S. Navy), laid down (the initial step in construction of the ship) April 19, 1899 by Union Iron Works, San Francisco; launched October 27, 1900; and commissioned September 4, 1902. She was based at Mare Island (near San Francisco) before the U.S. entered WWI; her operations took her off the coasts of Alaska, Mexico and Hawaii. She was one of the ships sent in aid of the aftermath of the San Francisco earthquake of April 18, 1906, fighting fires, providing medical aid, and patrolling in areas threatened by looters. She was present at the Fourth Battle of Topolobampo, the final naval action of the Topolobampo naval campaign of the Mexican Revolution. WWI service included guarding the Panama Canal and patrolling the Florida Keys. She was decommissioned on July 2, 1919, and sold for scrap on January 5, 1920. Though we don’t know how long the sender of this postcard served on Perry, (without extensive research, which we will not pursue here) it is nonetheless interesting to note the connection, and imagine him doing sketches in his leisure time, as (unless he was only joking) it sounds like he was a very good artist.

Divided Back, used postcard. Postmarked San Diego, California, May 25, 1911. Publisher unknown. No. 947[?] Likely one from a series of “bird” postcards.

Price:  $10.00

Sources:  Year: 1900; Census Place: West Albany, Linn, Oregon; Roll: 1349; Page: 1A; Enumeration District: 0037; FHL microfilm: 1241348. 1910; Census Place: USS Perry, US Navy, Military and Naval Forces; Roll: T624_1784; Page: 1A; Enumeration District: 0086; FHL microfilm: 1375797. 1920; Census Place: Mendocino, Sonoma, California; Roll: T625_150; Page: 1A; Enumeration District: 166; Image: 961. 1930; Census Place: Healdsburg, Sonoma, California; Roll: 222; Page: 4A; Enumeration District: 0023; Image: 142.0; FHL microfilm: 2339957. (Ancestry.com)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Perry_%28DD-11%29

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

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Categories: Birds, Postcards, Postcards Used

Irises At Heian Shrine

Posted on March 4th, 2014 by

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“Blooming Irises in ‘Heian’ Shrine Garden (Kyoto).”

Postcard from photo taken in the gardens of the Heian Shrine in Kyoto, Japan, which is a top-ranked Shinto shrine of great cultural importance. This card is obviously not old, but we came across it in with some vintage postcards, and had to get it simply for it’s beauty. Per a Wikipedia entry, this renowned garden, created by gardener Jihei Ogawa 7th, was some twenty years in the making, and is a popular local and tourist destination.

Availability status and pricing:  This one was given to a friend, and only the digital image is available. $2.00

Divided back, unused. Published by NBC (Nippon Beauty Color) Inc., Japan. Copyright. Printed in Japan. No. 553. Date unknown, circa 1980s – 2000?

Source:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heian_Shrine

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Categories: Postcards, Postcards Unused

Salinas Rodeo Girls

Posted on March 2nd, 2014 by

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“Showing their Levi’s, California Rodeo, Salinas, July 13 – 16, 1939”

Great vintage postcard showing photo of seven beautiful cowgirls lined up and posing in their dungarees, boots, hats, and western shirts. Photo taken at the Salinas, California Rodeo grounds for the July 1939 four-day event. If you look closely you will see two horses with their riders in the background.

Divided back, unused postcard. Publisher unknown, S-34 (series 34 or number S34)  Circa 1939.

Availability status:  SOLD. (This postcard is the second of two of the same photo – both were sold.)

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Categories: Hats, Photos Without Names, Postcards Unused, Rodeo, Salinas California

With All Kind Thoughts

Posted on March 2nd, 2014 by

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“Holbrook Aug 4, 1912. Dear cousen. I ame all right and hope you are felling better then you was or at least not so tired. well I have had some bad luck since I come home friday I lost that horse we was talk about. I docter her all day then next day after I got home she died about ten oclock at night. the little colt is just seven weeks old she was the best one I had. from your cousen J. W. Carter”

Another in the J. W. Carter series, and a terribly sad one.  We send all kind thoughts and ((hugs)) to J. W. and the colt. The horseshoe on the front of the card is appropriate, isn’t it?

On the bright side, this is a lovely, understated card of a gold-tone horseshoe with a small bunch of four-leaf clover that is caught up in a red ribbon. Below these good luck symbols is a city skyline scene, which appears way off in the distance. A white border of scroll work and clover complete the card.

Divided back, embossed postcard, unused with writing. Circa 1912. Publisher:  KLC or KL Company. Series 109.

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Categories: Postcards, Postcards Unused With Writing, The J. W. Carter Postcard Collection

Mary D. Piepho Calling Card

Posted on March 2nd, 2014 by

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Calling card, circa 1883 – 1888

Price:  $10.00          Size:  About 1 and 3/4 x 3 and 3/4″

Calling card for Mary D. Piepho, found in the Central Coast area of California. The lettering and stylized scroll work around the capital letters are beautiful, and a close-up look of the pink bow and “folded over” area reveals surprising details of the grain in the ribbon (or perhaps they are stripes) and the fabric-like fringe on the edges of the corner fold.

The woman that carried this calling card is possibly the same person that appears in the Illinois death index, born in Dyer, Indiana 1867, married to Henry Witte and died in Blue Island, Illinois 1943. If this is the correct person, then she married Henry in December of 1888, so this calling card would be from about 1883 – 1888. As of the date of this post, no one else was found under the name of Mary Piepho with the middle initial “D” and while there’s no certainty of having found the correct person, this Mary Piepho is the most probable.

Sources:  Year: 1870; Census Place: Hanover, Lake, Indiana; Roll: M593_333; Page: 387A; Image: 513; Family History Library Film: 545832. (Ancestry.com)

Year: 1880; Census Place: Hanover, Lake, Indiana; Roll: 291; Family History Film: 1254291; Page: 586B; Enumeration District: 073; Image: 0586. (Ancestry.com)

Lake County Indiana; Index to Marriage Record 1850 – 1920 Inclusive Vol, W. P. A. Original Record Located: County Clerk’s O; Book: E; Page: 303. (Ancestry.com)

Ancestry.com. Illinois, Deaths and Stillbirths Index, 1916-1947 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.

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Categories: Calling Cards and Business Cards

Onboard The S.S. Tacoma

Posted on March 2nd, 2014 by

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Old photo, circa 1920, white border.

Price:  $12.00         Size:  About 5 and 3/4 x 3″ and 1/2″.

This is the second photo that, as previously mentioned, likely came from the same unknown family photo album. (See post entitled Onboard The S.S. Alameda.) Perhaps this is grandfather and granddaughter or father and daughter, posing in front of lifeboat number 1, and perhaps these are the same two people that we see on the back of the Tacoma photo. In trying to date this one, we notice that this photo (like the other) has a white border, we see that the little girl is wearing a dress with bloomers, a cloche hat, the man’s suit lapels are rather wide, we notice his hat, the width of his tie, and of course we will look at when this steamship was in operation. The photo caught the little girl (as so often happens to us all, thank goodness now for digital) with eyes closed, and we see other details like it looks like the man has a pencil in his suit pocket, and is that a binoculars case behind his feet? Was the bag on the left for general traveling purposes or was he a businessman and this was a type of briefcase?

The back shows the partial photos of a person who appears to be an older woman, and of a lawn in front of some steps leading up to a building, with the image of the building being very faded. (Wouldn’t it be hilarious if someone recognized this building?)

The S.S. Tacoma, owned by the Puget Sound Navigation Company, was in service between 1913 – 1938 and was known as one of the best-designed and fastest vessels to operate on Puget Sound. She was built of steel, weighed 836 tons, was 209 feet in length, and operated by a steam engine, single propeller. Her speed exceeded the initial expectation of 19 knots, and was timed as high as 21.5 knots. 1913 – 1930 saw her high speed service between the Washington cities of Tacoma and Seattle, but better roads and increased vehicle traffic between the two cities led to the termination of the marine service, and on December 15, 1930 Tacoma made her last regular run. She was still used for occasional excursions between Seattle, Washington and Victoria, British Columbia up until 1938 when she was sold for scrap (always sad to read these types of things) along with some other vessels. (Wikipedia)

As to the date of the photo, one apparently can spend years (kidding, and this is nothing new) searching styles of clothing, hats and shoes. The man’s hat most closely resembles a boater, but it doesn’t necessarily appear to be made from straw. The suit lapels and tie were a little hard to pin down for year. Examples of little girl’s dresses with bloomers were found for the 1920s…In all probability this photo is from the 1920s, especially since the steamer’s regular service stopped at the end of 1930. Some great photos of Tacoma can be found at the second source listed below.

Sources:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacoma_%28steamship%29

http://www.evergreenfleet.com/steamertacoma.html

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Categories: Boats and Ships, Children, Photos Without Names

Onboard The S.S. Alameda

Posted on March 1st, 2014 by

Onboard the S.S. Alameda p1Onboard the S.S. Alameda p2

Old photo, circa 1920

Price:  $12.00           Size:  About 5 and 1/4 x 3 and 1/4″

This is the first of two related photos:  one regarding the S.S. Alameda and the other regarding the S.S. Tacoma. Both very likely came out of the same unknown family photo album. Too bad about the missing part of this photo on the back. I peeled off a little more of the black photo album paper to see if this might have been a Real Photo Postcard but there were no postcard markings underneath, so this (and likely the other) were not made into postcards. You can see some writing at the bottom here, of the type that is processed at the same time as the photo, so maybe this one was a photo that was offered to passengers. I’m not sure if the gentleman posing here next to lifeboat number 12 is the captain or a crew member. The insignia on the hat is hard to read. If anyone can lend clarification, please let me know.

The S.S. Alameda was a commercial steamship built in 1883 in Philadelphia by the William Cramp & Sons Shipbuilding Co. She weighed 5,000 tons, was 332 feet, 5 inches in length, held a crew of 52, and ran at a speed of 15 knots (wikipedia.) There are numerous photos online for her, the one below is from the Library of Congress, and shows her docked (assuming she is docked here in this photo) at Anchorage, Alaska. Just per some quick searches of other online sources, we find that her voyages included many along the Pacific Coast to Alaska, and that she also made trips to San Francisco from ports of Auckland, New Zealand, Sidney, Australia and Honolulu, (at that time Territory of) Hawaii. The third source listed below shows several transcriptions of ship passenger lists from these three embarkation points. (It’s always fascinating to look at passenger lists, and this one from 1893 shows interesting occupations of the travelers such as Actor, Marble Maker and Gold Miner.)

S.S. Alameda photo

The S.S. Alameda operated up until November 28, 1931, when she unfortunately burned in a pier fire in Seattle, Washington. She was registered with the U.S. Navy during WWI but was never commissioned into navy service.

Sources:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Alameda_%28ID-1432%29

http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/99614671/

http://www.immigrantships.net/v2/1800v2/alameda18930831.html

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Categories: Boats and Ships, Photos Without Names

Studio Portrait Of A Beautiful Girl

Posted on February 28th, 2014 by

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This one was found in a small antique store in the Watsonville, California area. There is no writing on the back of the photo, and the only identifying information we have for the photographer is the embossed design at the top left of the photo cover and the embossed “H” at the cover’s bottom right. We have a dated photo of the same type showing under the posting entitled “Harriet L. Weston, 1917”  so perhaps this photo is from around this date.

From a close-up view of the photo it looks like the young lady is wearing a jumper (sleeveless dress worn over a blouse) style outfit, except that the wide linen collar appears to be of a lighter color than that of the sleeves, so jumper may not technically be the correct term. In any case the outfit, though plain, was probably lovely. (Thinking of the quality of the fabrics.) It’s very possible that this is a school uniform, and most young ladies would surely scoff at the description of “lovely”, but in browsing other vintage uniform photos, we see that some of them were really very stylish, and anyway, who doesn’t appreciate a fine linen blouse? The other factor indicating that this could be a school photo is the fact that she wears no jewelry and wears her hair swept back from the forehead, and short in the back, to mid-ear. It’s hard to tell whether this is really a bob or if she had longer hair that was pinned up, but the style has that overall wholesome look.

Size:  About 4 and 3/4″ x 2 and 1/4″  Date:  circa 1915 – 1920.

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Categories: Photos Without Names

Thou Art Dear To Me

Posted on February 28th, 2014 by

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Undivided back, used postcard, circa 1901-1907. The cancellation mark shows Abbeville and appears to indicate the month of December, but the year is missing.

Price  $8.00

Beautiful undivided back era postcard in muted tones (except for the yellow) showing an image of lovely red-haired woman in what appears to be a Grecian or Roman style dress, holding a sprig of flowers, with the caption, “Thou art dear to Me.”  We see some flowers directly behind her and the suggestion of a column. The border is done in a robin’s egg blue with a simple design of yellow and white flowers.

The back’s lettering shows the words “Post Card” and “This side for the address only”  done in a silver tone. At the top left is a small block letter “A” which may be the publisher logo, but nothing, as of yet, has been found for this supposed publisher. (Another one for the mystery category.) The card is addressed to:

“Miss Rubie Stubbs. Abbeville GA”  with  “R. F. D.”  written at the bottom left, which stands for  “Rural Free Delivery.”  This was used in rural areas for houses that did not have a street address.

Ruby Stubbs, appears on the 1900 Federal Census in Abbeville, as the youngest child of George W. and Maria Stubbs. Her older siblings are Annie, Mary L., Emmett, Homer and Hassan. All are born in Georgia, with Ruby’s date of birth showing as about January 1890.

Update:

In response to contact from a reader that has another postcard addressed to Ruby and was wondering if there was an address for her, I had looked for more info, no address found but here’s some additional info:

“I don’t have an address other than what the 1900 census shows when Ruby was about 10 years old, which is just the town of Abbeville (specifically Militia District 1158 written at the top of the census page) in Wilcox county. Looking at random pages on that census, it seems their were no house numbers, or even a road listed, for any of the town’s residents at that time. I do see that their father, George W. Stubbs, unfortunately died later that year, in July 1900, and the 1910 census taken in Abbeville shows the mother, Maria and three of the adult kids were living next door to Ruby’s older brother Hassan (Samuel Hassan Stubbs) and his family. Ruby had married James F. Nance, October 7, 1909.”

Sources:  Year: 1900; Census Place: Abbeville, Wilcox, Georgia; Roll: 229; Page: 4B; Enumeration District: 0099; FHL microfilm: 1240229. (Ancestry.com)

Year: 1910; Census Place: Militia District 1158, Wilcox, Georgia; Roll: T624_219; Page: 18B; Enumeration District: 0139; FHL microfilm: 1374232. (Ancestry.com)

“Georgia, County Marriages, 1785-1950,” database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:KXJ5-7KD : 7 February 2020), James F. Nance and Rubie E. Stubbs, 17 Oct 1909; citing Marriage, Wilcox, Georgia, United States, Georgia Department of Archives and History, Morrow, FHL microfilm 271,347.

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Categories: Postcards, Postcards Used

Best Wishes From J. W. C.

Posted on February 24th, 2014 by

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“Holbrook Nebr Aug 8, 1912. Dear Cousen, your card got here all ok. I was glad to here from you did the Dr. put Mark in a cast. I ame glad yous dont have to set up any more. I ame out hay agin it is some that i start to leave for seed and it ant no good. I have some for seen yet I will haft to cuting of hay as I can get at it – from your cousen J. W. C.”

Front shows scene inside gold-tone oval of stylish young woman in hat, carrying a basket, gathering rushes or cattails, perhaps. She is at the water’s edge and in the background, across the water, we see a house, sort of cottage-like, maybe in stone, with a taller portion on the left. Mountains appear in the distance, and in the foreground on the left we see what appears to be a duck or goose (or swan?) This lovely scene has a muted effect and is done mostly in tones of blue, green, and brown. Surrounding the oval is a beautiful embossed scroll work of white on pale greenish gray, with a white border. The lettering “Best Wishes From” appears at the bottom with a space where J. W. has filled in his initials.

Divided back, embossed postcard, unused with writing. Publisher K. L. C. or K. L. Company. Series 150. Circa 1912.

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Categories: Postcards, Postcards Unused With Writing, The J. W. Carter Postcard Collection