To: Miss Isabell Cox From: Pittsburg Press 1907
Take my advice — Stop the Saturday Evening Post and take the Pittsburg Press
When I first scanned this card into my digital collection, I didn’t take much notice of it other than the postmark. It had come to me as part of a bulk lot, and I was new to collecting. The card looked old, and it felt old, and the postmark confirmed that it WAS old, and that was all I needed. So I scanned it in.
Only once I really started to create this blog did I realize what I had.
Junk mail. I have 117 year old junk mail. This junk mail is almost as old as Edward Cullen. Now, if this were an actual connection, of course this would be so super cool. But junk mail? It’s a little disheartening to know that people were getting non-desired mailers even during the undivided back period. Though something about it does feel so…human?
For a western town, Greeley, Colorado was quite up and coming. Originally founded as an “agricultural utopia” based on farming, temperance, and religion, the town seemed always on the forefront of modernity. Telephones were installed as early as 1883 and electric lights graced the Greeley downtown by 1886. It’s fitting, therefore, that the residents were interested in the Saturday Post, since it truly was the bees knees. It’s just as fitting that the Pittsburgh Press was trying to get a hold on the burgeoning town.
And what of Isabell Cox? First, I suspect the name was misspelled (does nothing change?), though it could be Isabella Cox, I suppose. I thought for sure I’d be able to find some semblance of her, but of course the archival Gods laughed at my certainty and left me stumped. In the end, there were a few good options. One Isabella Cox who was living in Colorado, but moved to New York by 1910, and an Isabel Cox who lived in the correct city…but was 4 in 1907.
I’d like to think this was sent to the 4 year old. Because of course it was. We’ve all received random junk mail for our children, and it seems that the turn of the 20th century was no different than the new millennia. Proof that times change, methodologies change…but capitalism never changes.
Undivided back, addressed to Miss Isabell Cox
Hipstory 