Sent by Harold Jones 1910 to Miss H.E. Jones, Brooklyn, N.Y., postmarked Hamilton, N.Y., March 26, 1908 Old Colgate postcards, whether found in a family scrapbook, discovered at an antique show, or avidly collected, seem to fascinate both young and old. With that in mind, the Scene reached out to writing and rhetoric professor Suzanne Spring, who studies women s 19th-century letter writing and teaches courses such as Visual Rhetoric and the Narrative in New Media. We asked her to help us choose a selection of cards drawn from the university archives as well as a Colgate parent s collection that caught our collective fancy, and share her thoughts. 26 scene: Autumn 2011
This postcard, with its trace of the hand that composed it, holds a kind of presence. What I prefer, about post cards, is that one does not know what is front or back, here or there, near or far Nor what is the most important, the picture or the text, and in the text, the message or the caption, or the address. Jacques Derrida, The Postcard am not sure which aspect of this 1908 Colgate postcard delights me more: the black-and-white image of bright light streaming into an empty hall strung with banners and bunting, or the message scrawled to the side and on the back: This is hall where Soph soirée was held. Decorated as at the dance. Rather light print, but gives a fairly good idea of hall. Have been at it all day lately finishing Chemistry. Exam Monday 10.30 Chemistry. Math Tues 8.15 am. Literature Wednesday. Through Friday. Expect they will be stiff this term. Hope you are all alright. Fair weather here now but somewhat chilly at nights. Suppose you are getting it comparatively warm now. Love to all, Harold. This postcard, with its trace of the hand that composed it, holds a kind of presence. Scholars of rhetoric have long understood presence as a central element of communication. Chaïm Perelman and Lucie Olbrechts-Tyteca note that one of the preoccupations of a writer is to make present, by verbal magic alone, what is actually absent. Presence is powerfully at play in the selection of cards chosen here, animated by the dynamic relationship between text and image, between verbal and visual magic. Harold s card evokes, for me, a few absent presences: the presence of light streaming out, not in, through windows into a darkening night. The presence of echoing voices, the relief of laughter, and a swirl of bodies in musical time. The presence of Harold, some time later in a quiet study corner, dipping pen into ink and remembering that night, sending out glimpses of his life at this college on a hill. The presence, even later, of mail arriving at 148 Spencer Street in Brooklyn and into the hand of Miss H.E. Jones. As vicarious interlopers into one side of a private exchange, we envision what is front and back, here and there, near and far : we attend to what is shared and what is withheld. Yet, even as I allow myself this pleasure of imagining, I hear the echo of documentary photographer Walker Evans s caution to renounce sentimentality and nostalgia ; to seek in the postcard, instead, the authenticity of the past. I find then how these postcards offer evidence of a loosely connected network of people students and others affiliated with Col- gate, as well as those who have lived in and passed through the village who took up their pens to mark their place in a rapidly changing world. I note how postcards circulated, even then, in a global system of exchange and how they affirm a set of values sometimes dominant, sometimes transgressive in what were distinct but interconnected cultures where the commodity of the visual had increasing purchase on the modern sense of place and self. In our current era of tweets and text messages, these hand-written artifacts provide a glimpse of how personal communication and expression what we talk about, and how we say it has changed, and also remained the same. Yet, ultimately, what has perhaps persisted most is the correspondent s demand for what literary scholar Janet Altman has described as the epistolary pact the call for response from a specific reader within the correspondent s world. For these postcards, of course, we are not those specific readers, we cannot really occupy those worlds, but perhaps, for a moment, we may find in them something of our own worlds reflected back to us. I am still waiting for that corner of a postal you promised to send. I expect to leave here for Lestershire very soon and would love to hear from you before leaving. This is my part of the contract, now you keep yours. Bob H., July 4, 1910, to Mr. Harry Willett, Red Creek, N.Y. Suzanne Spring, assistant professor of writing and rhetoric News and views for the Colgate community 27
Sent to Miss Addie Hawley, Petrus Corners, Lewis County, N.Y., postmarked Beaver River, N.Y., March 19, 1907 Sent to Mr. G.D. Cox, Kings County, Nova Scotia, postmarked Hamilton, N.Y., Sept. 30, 1907 Avid postcard collector Bob Lippman began collecting Colgate cards as a gift for his daughter Jessica 10 back when she was first accepted early decision. By the time she graduated, he had amassed more than 160, including this one at left. Sent to Miss Elizabeth Bingham, London, England, postmarked Hamilton, N.Y., July 19, 1905 28 scene: Autumn 2011
The first postcards were unadorned post-paid cards circulated primarily for government and business correspondence. They proved lucrative for the U.S. postal service; in the latter months of 1873, 60 million cards were sold at one cent each. The first picture postcards can be traced to the 1860s and 1870s. Sent to Miss Jennie Gill, Boonville, N.Y., postmarked Hamilton, N.Y., Sept. 24, 1919 Collecting postcards, also known as deltiology, has been described as the second-most popular hobby after coin collecting. Several different series of Colgate postcards were produced. The majority of early colored Colgate postcards were commissioned and sold by R.W. Hurlburd, who advertised his department store that catered to Colgate students in the 1911 Salmagundi. There are approximately 114 in the Elite series made by C.H. Phelps of Sidney, N.Y. but the archives collection only has representatives of approximately 70 of these. News and views for the Colgate community 29
In 1909 alone, 668 million postcards were mailed in the United States. In 1902, Kodak began selling photographic processing paper, preprinted with a postcard back, which made oneof-a-kind postcard images possible. Presumably, Harold s dance hall card on pg. 26 is an example of these. Documentary photographer Walker Evans described postcards as folk document and the truest visual records ever made of any period. He collected more than 9,000 of them. Sent to Mrs. Robt. Good, Elmira, N.Y., postmarked May 13, 1951 Dear Phyl, Bob, Randy, and Laurie, I am up here under slightly different circumstances. Parents Weekend we are eating tonite at the Oxen Club. Brother Baby Bill is a X pledge never did I think that. History repeats itself. We bought a house and things are great. How about coming down this summer. Love to all, Louise. Beyond personal communication and souvenir mementos, postcards have been used for advertising, propaganda, and social and political activism. Because postcards are rich resources for the study of culture, over the past 25 years, a new interdisciplinary field postcard studies has emerged. To see more Colgate postcards and a list of sources about postcard history, go to colgateconnect.org/scenegateposts 30 scene: Autumn 2011
Sent to Mr. David Jones, Spencer St., Brooklyn, N.Y., postmarked Hamilton, N.Y., April 8, 1907 This is the crowd of whose doings I wrote something to you. This is a pretty good photograph of most of the fellows as for myself. The three in second row center are Glee Club Lead, Manager and Leader of Band. Harold Sent to Miss Elizabeth Arthur, Lowville, N.Y., postmarked Hamilton, N.Y., Nov. 8, 1906 I spent a summer in this house when a young girl. No porch was on it then but I spent many happy days there. How are you both this wintry weather. We don t mind the cold as long as it is sunny. M.D.K. The Colgate archives currently hold more than 500 antique postcards, 450 of them Colgate-related. Several large groupings were donated by the family members of alumni such as J. Herbert Owen 16 or others who found them when sorting out the departed s belongings after they passed away. scenegateposts News and views for the Colgate community 31