May 2008 - South Jersey Postcard Club

The official quarterly newsletter of the South Jersey Postcard Club
Serving Postcard Collectors Since 1971 – John H. McClintock, Founder
May 2008
Vol. 8. No. 2
Information submitted by Bud Plumer
Philadelphia Department of Records holds one of the country’s largest municipal archives of historic
photographs , totaling an estimated two million images.1
For those of you who have forgotten … yes, I’m being
facetious , Colonel Morrell was a well known Philadelphia
lawyer who served in the US House of Representatives from
1901 to 1907. He was married to one of the Drexel daughters
who was a great-aunt to Jacqueline Kennedy. The land area
of Morrell Park, once at Morrell Avenue and Frankford Avenue,
was originally a 300-acre summer estate owned by the
Colonel’s family. Most of the area today is taken over by the
Torresdale-Frankford Country Club.
If you have any interest in Philadelphia history, this site is
an interesting and valuable source.
_______________________________________
1
Boonin, Harry D. “PhillyHistory: Online Collection of Historic
Philadelphia Photographs.” CHRONICLES [Magazine], December
2007.
CHRONICLES [Magazine] is the journal of the Jewish
Genealogical Society of Philadelphia. In a recent article we
learn from an outline and description of a new website
(www.phillyhistory.org) that more than 50,000 photographs
of Philadelphia are available free of charge, if your needs are
satisfied by low-resolution images. If you like, you may
purchase professional quality photographs from the website
at very reasonable prices.
When searching the site you have a choice of address,
neighborhood (158 to choose from), keyword, or year. For
example, if you wish to find a photograph of the old Mt.
Vernon School, where our member Bud Plumer’s mother,
Mary Plumer was a teacher from 1921 to 1929, you need
only click on the main page’s search button and then type in
a keyword like, Vernon. In a memo that Bud sent your
editor he mentions that he has a personal interest in three of
the buildings talked about in the article – two of which his
firm still manages.
The website shows only a few entries when you type in
the keyword postcard, but I did manage to find this image
from a real-photo taken in 1895 and apparently published at
a somewhat later date. It shows Colonel Edward Morrell in
the driver's seat of a coaching wagon in front of the Stratford
Hotel at Broad and Walnut Streets. The picture seems to be
of parade preparations .
š›
Myra Hess
Amid the extraordinary circumstances in wartime Britain, there
arose a musical heroine, the pianist Myra Hess, whose
leadership in bringing music to her
countrymen from London's National
Gallery was often an act of
considerable bravery. In defiance of
the Nazi raids, Myra Hess, along with
hundreds
of
other
musicians,
performed classical music concerts as
bombs fell on the city. Ironically, the
music most often featured at these
concerts was that of German
composers, which sent a strong
message to the enemies of democracy
that Britain could admire the culture of
the German people while abhorring the political realities of the
Nazi Reich.
Hess originally had a wide-ranging repertoire including
contemporary composers and virtuoso showpieces. In the
1930s she pruned her repertoire to what she dubbed the "roast
beef of music" — Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Mozart, Scarlatti,
Schubert and Schumann — seasoned with occasional "shrimp
cocktails" from Debussy and Ravel. In the first months of
World War II, all live music performances ceased in Britain.
Learning of this crisis, Dame Myra cut short an American tour,
returned to London and inaugurated what was to become a
remarkable and popular series of lunch-time concerts at the
National Gallery, a building then emptied of its treasures for
safekeeping during the Blitz. This was exactly what people
needed since the black-outs made it difficult for London's
suburban residents to travel up to town after dark. Classical
music, thus symbolically and physically, replaced the paintings
and sculptures of the National Gallery, and an audience which
included not only regular devotees, but also many who had
never heard such music before came about because of Hess's
brainchild to replace one kind of art with another. Her work
enabled the National Gallery to continue functioning as Great
Britain's main center of art.
Dame Myra Hess died in 1965.
The card above is a non-postcard back arcade card.
May 2008
r
South Jersey Postcard Club
President’s Corner by Bob Duerholz
HIGH-TECH POSTCARDS???
My title appears to be an oxymoron. How can a simplistic
penny postcard be high-tech? Well it is 2008, and yes, the
postcard has evolved.
I received a St. Patrick’s Day postcard from a friend. I
must confess the postcard did not arrive via Uncle Sam’s
mail service, but on my computer. Now I realize many of our
club members do not own computers, but I think I can
describe this PC so you will picture this new use of our
beloved old postcard. Those that own computers are
probably familiar with greeting card web sites. The postcard
I received is an extension of that idea with a high-tech twist.
The postcard I received included the line we have seen
thousands of times, i.e., “WISH YOU WERE HERE.” The
address section was addressed to me, but would you
believe, when you clicked on the stamp, you incorporated a
cancellation mark?
The face of the card was a beautiful small cottage in an
Irish country side scene, (much like our real postcards), but
picture birds flying, (I mean moving through the air), and
flowers waving in the light breeze. All of this is accompanied
by delightful, soft Irish music. Now this is, as I say, a hightech PC.
Honestly, I would have preferred receiving a standard
paper penny card in my mailbox. I guess I am too old
fashion and will never change.
Happy searching and collecting,
r
Page 2.
Minutes from the April Meeting
• President Bob Duerholz chaired the meeting with 17 present
• Emily DiVento read the minutes and the treasurer’s report was
given by Sal Fiorello.
• BEST CARD CONTEST was won by John Niveen. His card is a
1930s era card published by the Union Pacific Railroad. It shows
Mountain Bluebirds.
• ANNOUNCEMENTS: the May meeting will be on May 18th (the
third Sunday) to avoid the Mother’s Day conflict. Same place,
same time, just one week later.
• THANKS YOU to John Niveen for his pic-box contribution.
• 50/50 was won by “Angel.” Jim McHugh, Angel’s owner, donated
her winnings to the club. Thank you.
Bob
r
Editor’s Niche by Ray Hahn
I am continually amazed by coincidence . . . at the April
meeting Bill Johnson, John Niveen, a couple others and I
were talking about ship cards and some one mentioned
“Titanic.” It happens all the time. Then Bill told us about a
ship wreck in the St. Lawrence Seaway in 1914 that involved
a ship named Empress of Ireland. I had never heard of the
event, and although others knew about it, we all agreed that
we had never seen a postcard of the ship.
Now shift gears to the postcard show at the Wildwood
Historical Society on April 19th, only six days later. It is a
very small show but it turned out to be an excellent one –
each dealer either is , or has been, a member of SJPC.
In the beautiful sunshine (yes, the show was out-ofdoors), I was looking for ship cards and what did I find? You
guessed it – a card of the Empress of Ireland.
Z
In the February issue, you may have read on Page 6 about
how to remove unwanted odors from old postcards. Recently
another source has been heard from … Another Way To
Remove Smells From Postcards - Nature's Air
Sponge is a product sold in Ace and Tru-Value Hardware
Stores in ½ and 1 pound blocks. It works best on tobacco
smoke, cooking odors, pet smells, paint, detergent, cleaning
solvents, wet carpets, fire damage, locker rooms, gasoline,
sewer gasses, mildew and decay, and even baby odors - all
through an absorption process.
Rampmeyer Elected Honorary Member
Otto Rampmeyer, a long-time member of SJPC, has been
chosen by the membership to be an Honorary Member. Otto
has been unable to attend meetings lately, but all except our
newest members know Otto for his genuine good humor and
friendly smile. Who could forget Otto’s 50/50 sales antics?
Remember how Otto always sold the “winning” ticket to you
and to everyone else in the room too? And, in some way or
another, he made us believe him. Otto we miss you.
Otto and Anne, our thoughts and prayers are with you.
Mark Your Calendar
PoCax ’08 - October 18, 2008
Double Tree Suites Hotel Mt. Laurel, New Jersey
South Jersey Postcard Club
President . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Bob Duerholz
Vice President . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Mimi Fridie
Treasurer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sal Fiorello
Secretary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Emily DiVento
2008 Trustee. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . John Valentino
2008 Trustee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Lynn McKelvey
2008 Trustee. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Ray Hahn
Immediate Past President . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Judi Kearney
Newsletter Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Ray Hahn
Please send club inquiries to:
The South Jersey Postcard Club
c/o Emily DiVento, Secretary
1746 Johnston Street, Philadelphia, PA 19145
UPCOMING CONTEST TOPICS
for May 18 – “pencil or pen/ink images.”
for June 8 – “a card with foreign language caption.”
for July 13 – “very old bathing suites.”
Please send newsletter inquiries and articles to:
Ray Hahn, Editor
908 Barbara Terrace, Millville, NJ 08332
or email to [email protected]
May 2008
South Jersey Postcard Club
Page 3.
Old Aviators PC Mystery Solved … Continued
By Bob Duerholz
When you read the February newsletter, my story left off with Crocker Snow watching helplessly as his newly designed aircraft
was being tested by a seat-of-the-pants pilot named Swede Parker. Crocker Snow watched in horror as the plane went into an
inverted spin. I now continue the story with Crocker Snow’s very own words from his book, Log Book, a Pilot’s Life.
Our show-off pilot Swede Parker. One of
his weaknesses as a pilot was impulsiveness. Our Amphibienne was a casualty."
SWEDE
As the plane went into a slow inverted spin, I hollered uselessly for Swede to bail
out. He did, landing on the underside of the center section. He then kicked himself
away from the still twirling prop, and fell free as the plane righted itself and
descended in a lazy spiral into nearby Little Buttermilk Bay.
Swede’s chute opened quickly, and he landed on our neighbor Wright Fabian’s
estate, a peninsula separating Buttermilk and Little Buttermilk Bays. By the time we
reached him, he was on the beach, unhurt and folding his chute. When we asked
what had happened, Swede confessed that the plane was handling so well, he had
intended to do a half roll followed by the last half of a loop, and buzz us before
heading for Boston. Unfortunately, he said the plane stalled upside-down before he
could get the nose down to finish the loop.
Swede was then still a low -time pilot. I always wondered if he had pushed the
stick forward to start his dive when the plane was on its back—the right thing to do
only when the plane is flying right side up. However, since flying boats were never
designed for aerobatics, there may have been nothing he could have done to
recover once he started his roll.
Our Amphibienne was washed out, but its Warner Scarab engine was unhurt,
and went on to fly again. Since we had only spent half our capital, Olcott and I
properly gave our fathers checks for $10,000. Pa, taking it all in good form, said it
was the quickest return he had ever had on an investment.
This was the end of our brief career in aircraft design and manufacture, but the
beginning of Swede Parker’s as a test pilot. He went on to tryout planes
professionally for Lockheed, and traveled to Japan in 1939 to train Japanese military
pilots. As an individual, he stayed flamboyant to the end. Returning from Japan, he
had an argument with Lockheed’s chief test pilot and fired several rifle shots into the
boss’s house. Swede’s second wife, Barbara, was a “Wampus” (a young movie
star), and a protégée of William Randolph Hearst. Hearst’s influence enabled
Swede to move to South America and avoid prosecution. In 1950, he disappeared
after leaving Gander, Newfoundland, to deliver a Superior Oil Company DC- 2 to the
Middle East. The Canadian government reported two occupants of the missing
plane: Swede and a mechanic. No flight plan was filed, and there was no radio
contact after takeoff. An extensive air search found nothing. The last time I saw his
wife, in 1972, she believed Swede was still alive, and probably a recruit of the
French Foreign Legion. It was a pretty fantasy.”
Wow! What a story of an adventurous early aviator. In my opinion Swede was a bold pilot, and as the old aviator’s adage
goes, “There are old pilots and bold pilots, but no old, bold pilots .” BUT then again maybe Swede’s wife Barbara was right, just
maybe. Maybe Swede is still up there in the wild blue yonder. What do you think?
Ironically, Swede trained Japanese pilots and Crocker Snow went on to fly many aircraft during World War II including B29s over Japan, but that’s another story.
š›
Real Photo Postcard Stamp Boxes
At a recent antique show in Moorestown, I was standing over a few boxes of
postcards , well presented by SJPC member Carol Pollock, when a novice collector
standing next to me asked, “Is this a real-photo postcard?” I looked at the back and
told him , no. His next question was, “What did you look for?” and I told him the
stamp-box. I explained that although there are more than three hundred different
stamp boxes on real-photo postcards, you don’t have to memorize them to
recognize one, and they are a sure-fire indicator of a real-photo postcard.
Shown here are a few of the most common. If you have an interest in realphotos, and you’re not sure about stamp boxes, you may want to look at:
http://www.playle.com/realphoto/photoall.php
May 2008
South Jersey Postcard Club
Page 4.
Elvins Corner, Hammonton, N.J.
Researching this card (see superimposed image above) was great fun.
Some Internet research and a couple
hours in the Hammonton Public Library
yielded some startling finds.
The library has available on-line its
entire archive of the South Jersey
Republican. Having access to those
newspapers helped me approach the
story of the Elvins Store in a ‘from now
back to then’ fashion.
On Saturday, September 4, 1897,
The Republican ran an Elvins General
Store advertisem ent on Page 1 at the
top of Column 1. (See background
image above.)
You can see that
George Elvins tells his customers that
prices are advancing steadily; but his
store is holding the line as much as
possible. Monday, September 6, 1897,
was Labor Day. Holiday or not, it may
be fair to assume that George’s store
would be open for business as usual.
George Elvins was born in 1839 in
Philadelphia.
His
father Andrew chose
to move the family to
Hammonton in 1858
and
soon
after
arriving
there
the
father and son cofounded a farm and
general supplies store
on Main Street (later known as the
White Horse Pike) at the corner of
Belleview Avenue. The Elvins Family
from then on was part of the social
spotlight for more than eighty years.
The store operated at that same
location until soon after George’s death
on February 6, 1923, at age 85.
George had a strong sense of public
service.
He was elected city tax
collector and treasurer in 1869, he was
a founding member of the Fruit
Growers Association that in 1880
demonstrated the value of using the
first refrigerated transportation to ship
berries to distant locations, and he was
a founding member of the Peoples
Bank of Hammonton in 1887. In 1881
George became the first New Jersey
Assemblyman from Hammonton.
George married Annie Clohosey and
the couple had seven children, all of
whom have made business and
philanthropic contributions to the city of
Hammonton and Atlantic County.
The South Jersey Republican, dating
back to 1887 carried weekly advertising
by the Elvins Store. Clover seed was a
specialty in 1905 and they had chicken
scratch on sale in 1910. In 1915
Plymouth Twine was a good seller and
in 1916 they started to carry Paris
Green. Lenox soap was on sale in
1922. The last Elvins advertisement, for
cranberries at 10¢ a quart, appeared in
the last issue of the newspaper – 1923.
The store building was torn down in
1941 and the property sold in 1955 to
Peoples Bank for a new branch office.
May 2008
South Jersey Postcard Club
Postcard Rekindles Tragic Memory
By Ray Hahn
The first alarm came into Atlanta Fire
Department headquarters at 3:42 on
December 7, 1946. On this pre-dawn
Saturday morning, Atlanta's Winecoff
Hotel, which had been billed as
"fireproof” because of its brick
construction, was ablaze.
Within
twenty minutes a fourth, final and
"general alarm" - the one reserved for a
citywide conflagration - went out.
This card is postmarked May 17, 1932.
The Atlanta Chronicle reported the
event as the most frightful hotel fire in
American history. The best of Atlanta’s
fire fighters and others from nearby
towns battled the blaze but were only
able to save 161 of the overnight
guests.
It was Atlanta's Titanic.
Problems arose when the fire
ladders reached only to the eighth floor
of the 15 story building, and again
when the jump nets proved incapable
of sustaining jumps from above 70 feet.
At the time of the fire, the building
lacked fire escapes, fire doors or
automatic fire sprinklers .
The fire was first ruled an accident
for it was thought careless smoking by
a hotel employee on the third floor had
set a mattress on fire. However in
1993 two men, who are sons of Atlanta
firemen who were there, wrote a book
suggesting that the fire was arson. The
authors claim a man from nearby
Fayette County set the fire to get
revenge against an enemy who was
playing in an all-night poker game at
the hotel.
Today, this is still considered the
worst hotel fire in U.S. history, and
most sources agree that 119 people
died. Dozens met their deaths on the
sidewalks and in the alley behind the
building after they jumped from their
room windows, but most died in their
rooms from burns and smoke
inhalation. Among the victims were
thirty of Georgia's most promising high
school students, who had come to
Atlanta to attend the YMCA's Youth
Assembly at the Capitol.
The Winecoff fire became a
watershed event with regard to fire
safety requirements in public buildings .
Within days, cities across America
enacted stringent Building Exiting
Codes, and since this fire no hotel has
been built without modern fire safety
regulations being in place before
construction begins.
The real tragedy is that 62 years
later, there is still no solid evidence as
to whether the fire was arson or an
accident.
***
In the Sunday, September 30, 2007,
Philadelphia Inquirer, Travel Section,
Daniel Yee, of the Associated Press
writes , “The Ellis Hotel will open on
October 17th to guests after a $28
million makeover. Once the Winecoff
Hotel, it is the site of the most deadly
hotel fire in American history.”
“We are very mindful of the event
and yet we are proud to be relaunching
something new,” said Susan Griffin of
the new hotel’s staff.
The building has been vacant for
many years and only recently served
as an office for the Georgia Baptist
Association.
The new hotel will have 127
rooms.
š›
Baltimore's Phoenix Shot Tower
Card loaned by Judi Kearney
In the days when shot for rifles – more
accurately 19th century era muskets –
was made in a "shot tower," molten
lead was dropped from the top of the
tower into a vat of cool water at the
bottom. By some complicated law of
physics the lead droplets, like
raindrops, would form into perfect
spheres, cool and solidify as they fell
into the cooling vat 234 feet below.
And so it went at the Phoenix Tower at
801 E. Fayette Street, Baltimore,
Maryland from 1828 to 1892.
Making usable shot has a long
history, but this particular business was
opened in Baltimore City in 1828 with
the name Merchant's Shot Company.
Page 5.
The Old Shot Tower, built 1828, Baltimore, MD
Both "drop shot" for pistols and rifles
and "molded shot" for larger weapons
such as cannon were made here.
When hardened, dried and polished,
the shot was sorted into 25-pound
bags.
Work crews often produced
more than a million bags of shot a year
– more when demand was high.
Only 17 Towers Left in World.
One of only eleven similar
buildings left in the United States, the
Phoenix Shot Tower was constructed
using more than one million bricks, and
was the tallest building in the United
States until the Washington Monument
in Washington, DC, was completed on
December 6, 1884. In 1972 Phoenix
Shot Tower was designated a National
Historic Landmark.
***
There
have
been
a
few
discussions of shot tower pos tcards at
SJPC meetings over the years. It is
generally agreed that no postcards of
the Philadelphia shot tower exist, but
cards of some others have been found.
***
The other ten American shot
towers are found in: Jackson Ferry,
Virginia; Philadelphia (Sparks Tower),
Pennsylvania; Dubuque, Iowa; St.
Louis, Missouri; New York City; Kings
Mills (Peters Tower), Ohio;
San
Francisco; Spring Green, Wisconsin;
and two in Connecticut; Remington’s
Tower in Bridgeport and Winchester’s
Shot Tower in New Haven.
World-wide there are six other shot
towers, one in Germany, three in
Australia, and two in England.
May 2008
Book Review:
South Jersey Postcard Club
Page 6.
Sometimes …
Way off the Road: Discovering
you simply learn more than you want to know.
by Ray Hahn
the Peculiar Charms of SmallRecently I decided that the pile of “yet to be filed” postcards
Town America by Bill Geist.
on the corner of my desk was simply too high. I knew there
Broadway Books, 2007.
Many of us recognize Bill Geist as the
red-headed, roving reporter for the CBS
News Sunday Morning program. He
has published several books over the
years; among them my favorite is The
Zucchini Plague & Other Tales of Suburbia. In this, his
newest and most entertaining book we find among the
pages the answer to the question we all ask ourselves; “Is
there a postcard for everything?” After reading the
chapter about Fruita, Colorado, I can emphatically answer,
“I don’t know, but we’re getting very, very close.”
In the chapter entitled, Mike the Headless Chicken,
Geist tells the story of Fruita (population 6,478) and how
the people of the town are completely enamored with
chickens and chicken lore.
It all started in September 1945 when Fruita dirt and
chicken farmer Lloyd Olsen was asked by this wife to
make an early morning trip to the hen-house to find their
dinner. It was 8 a.m. when Olsen lopped off the head of a
plump fryer heavy enough to feed three – his mother-inlaw was coming to dinner.
Everyone knows the common lore that chickens may
continue to live without their heads, but Mike continued to
walk around the barn yard for more than a week. (The
chicken was dubbed Miracle Mike when the Grand
Junction Daily Sentinel ran his “life-story.”) There is no
record what the Olsen family did for dinner that September
evening.
After that first week, Farmer Olsen took Mike for an
examination by poultry specialists at the University of Utah
in Salt Lake City. They pronounced him healthy. Olsen
then took Mike on a national tour that included New York
City, Chicago and Los Angeles where he charged 25¢ for
the opportunity to peek over the top of a cardboard fence.
News sources affirm that thousands of people gladly paid
the quarter. And, on several occasions Mike posed for a
local photographer who made real-photos that were sold
to those who were unable to pay to admission fee.
I couldn’t find a postcard made in the 1940s, but this modern card
shows a four-foot tall metal sculpture of “Mike the Chicken” that was
erected in Fruita, Colorado, during the first annual Chicken festival in
2000.
Miracle Mike lived for eighteen months without his
head. He died, while still on tour, in March 1947 in an
Arizona motel. Not the first celebrity to so demise.
were perhaps a hundred or more cards that had to be
taken to the club’s pic-box or the closest trash can. Here is
a brief story of why neither of those places became the final
depository for a couple dime-box treasures.
These two cards must have come into my possession
only because they are artist-drawn cards; the signature is
Juanita Miller, and dear readers, I promise that is the only
thing I knew about the cards until I Googled (did an Internet
search for) the artist.
Believe me; the name Juanita Miller is fairly common; I
found nearly 300 women in the USA with that name. One
such person works for the State of Maryland as a special
education administrator, another was curator and then
director of the Robert E. Lee Boyhood Home in Virginia,
and among doctors, lawyers, teachers and even a
proctologist there is Juanita Joaquina Miller, an artist and
poet from Oakland, California – the person I wanted to
learn about.
The artist was the daughter of Cincinnatus Heine who
lived by and used the pen-name Joaquin Miller to publish
his poetry, essays and fables that dealt with life in
California prior to the gold-rush years. Most of his work
was quite esoteric but very fashionable for the first half of
the nineteenth century. Probably his most famous opus
was a poem entitled Columbus – it was memorized by
generations of schoolchildren and contains the familiar
refrain:
What shall we do when hope is gone?”
The words leapt like a leaping sword:
“Sail on! Sail on! Sail on! And on!”
Ms. Miller was also an accomplished poet and in 1919
published an illustrated, 41-page book entitled About “The
Hights” at Oakland, California. It was a tribute to her father
who died in 1913, and a characterization of his estate that
he called, The Hights. Because of its historical importance
the University of California recommended the book as a
Google Online Text. The postcards above are two of a
dozen or more illustrations in the book. So now, the simple
truth of the matter is, instead of ridding myself of two rather
non-descript cards, I am now on a quest to find the rest of
the set.
Today the Miller estate is the Joaquin Miller Memorial
Park and is a designated California Historical Landmark.
May 2008
South Jersey Postcard Club
Page 7.
A Trip to the DAM; Well Worth the Visit
Delaware Art Museum • 2301 Kentmere Parkway • Wilmington, Delaware 19806
The Delaware Art Museum has reason to be proud of its
accomplishments. They have brought the visual arts to the
citizens of the Delaware Valley in a classic and romantic
way. The collection is way beyond ordinary and the 33mile trip from Philadelphia down I-95 to Wilmington is well
rewarded. Admission is only $8.00 for Seniors and a lightfare lunch with gourmet coffees or specialty teas can be
had in the Del-ART Café for under $10.
Most noteworthy is the museum’s accumulation of
paintings from the artists who fancied themselves as the
Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. The Pre-Raphaelites were a
band of English painters and critics who came together in
1848 and vowed to the world that their painting would be
void of the mechanistic approach that swelled the art-world
by career artists who succeeded Raphael and
Michelangelo.
In many ways
the
Brotherhood
succeeded,
but
youth is often a
character flaw when
too
little
life
experience is had to
enjoin the creative
juices and complete
promises that need
to be kept.
At the initial
meeting John Everett
Millais,
Dante
Gabriel Rossetti and
William Holman Hunt
were present. In the
months that followed
other artists, the likes
of Thomas Woolner
and James Collinson joined the group. There were nearly
a dozen others who associated with the group, among
them Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, and although he is
seldom mentioned in the literature, Frederick Sandys is
always characterized as a Pre-Raphaelitist.
Two of many paintings available as modern postcards
are here. The first is entitled Isabella and the Pot of Basil
(1867), above, by William Holman Hunt. The picture tells
the story of a victim
of lost love who
vows to keep her
lover’s favorite plant
alive with her tears.
The other is Mary
Magdalene (c.1859)
by Frederick Sandys.
The
museum
also has in its
permanent collection
works by a favorite
Wilmington
son,
Howard Pyle, the
world-renowned
author and illustrator
of
The
Merry
Adventures of Robin
Hood and Howard
Pyle’s Book of Pirates.
John Sloan, the Ash-Can School artist who made New
York City his personal portrait model is well represented as
are American artists Jacob Lawrence, Edward Loper, and
Reginald Marsh.
If you make this journey, do have lunch at the
Café. It is friendly and comfortable. The food is good too.
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Special Note About the October Mystery Card
The October challenge concerning the St. James Annex
brought quite a response. A couple “I think it’s …” were
received but the answer came when Tom Kearney sent a
photo of the Midtown Apartments Building. The address is
1218 Walnut Street at the corner of Camac Street.
Congratulations, Tom.
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Coming in August
Direct from his hometown
of Jackson, Tennessee, the
True Story of Casey Jones.
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Page 7. Mystery Card. You can win this card!
For Londoners this postcard
scene is a familiar site. The
picture (taken from midspan on the Westminster
Bridge that crosses the
Thames River) is the world
famous Clock Tower at the
Houses of Parliament. The
clock has four faces and
each face is 21 feet wide.
The 13½ ton bell, with a
clapper that weights 441
pounds, that greets each
hour
of
the
day
is
affectionately known to the
world as Big Ben, but that is
not its official name.
To win, be the first to
answer this question. What is the official name of the bell?
May 2008
South Jersey Postcard Club
Page 8.
A New Page 8 Series – Faces of American Theatre
Maude Adams
Maude Adams’s most noted role, Peter, in
J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan, brought millions to
wait at stage doors for an up-close glimp of
"Maudie.” That’s the name used by those
who adored her. Ethel Barrymore was a
close rival, but Maude Adams was without
a doubt the decade’s most beloved and
most successful stage actress.
Maude Ewing Adams Kiskadden was
born on November 11, 1872, at Salt Lake
City, Utah, to a mother who was an actress.
While travelling with her mother, Maude
spent her early years in provincial theatres,
sometimes even appearing in plays as an
infant, when she was carried onstage in her
mother’s arms. Her official professional
debut was at the age of five in a San
Francisco theatre. Being quiet, resolved,
and confident made her popular both in
public and behind the scenes.
Little is known of Maude’s father, John
Kiskadden. He died in 1878 when she was
only six, thus most of what is known of her ancestry traces
through her maternal grandmother, Julia Ann (Banker)
Adams. The Banker family came from Plattsburgh, n
i
upstate New York where Maude's great grandfather Platt
Banker converted to Mormonism, and it is said that the
family migrated to Missouri with the Joseph Smith party.
Whether this is true or not, the family did migrate to
Missouri, where Julia married Barnabus Adams (a distant
cousin of President John Adams and President John
Quincy Adams). The family later migrated to Utah, settling
in Salt Lake City where Maude's mother Asaneth Ann
"Annie" Adams was born. Maude Adams was also a
descendant of Mayflower passenger John Howland.
After touring in Boston and California, Adams made
her New York City debut at age 16 as a member of the
Edward Sothern Theatre Company. She soon became a
member of Charles H. Hoyt's stock company, but in 1889,
the powerful producer Charles Frohman took control of her
career. He asked David Belasco and Henry C. de Mille to
write a part for her in their new 1890 play Men and Women.
After 1890 Frohman paired her with John
Drew, Jr. in a series of plays beginning with
The Masked Ball and ending with Rosemary
in 1896. She spent five years as the leading
lady in John Drew's company.
Her greatest triumphs came in works by
Barrie, including The Little Minister, Quality
Street, and Peter Pan, the latter being the
role with which she was most closely
identified and the one repeated most often.
Adams last appeared on the New York
stage in A Kiss For Cinderella in 1916. In
1922 she donated her estates at Lake
Ronkonkoma to the Sisters of St. Regis for
use as a novitiate and retreat hous e.
Following a thirteen year retirement from the
stage, during which she worked with
General Electric to develop improved and
more powerful stage lighting, she appeared
in
several
regional
productions
of
Shakespeare.
She headed the drama
department at Stephens College in Missouri
Submitted by John Valentino
from 1937 to 1943, becoming well known as
an inspiring teacher in the art of acting.
Maude Adams died July 17, 1953 at
aged 80, at her summer home, Caddam Hill,
in Tannersville, New York and is interred in
the cemetery of Cenacle Convent, Lake
Ronkonkoma, New York.
The character of Elise McKenna in
Richard Matheson's 1975 novel Bid Time
Return and its 1980 film adaptation
Somewhere in Time, in which the character is
played by Jane Seymour, is based upon her.
In the novel, Elise is appearing in The Little
Minister, which Barrie is said to have written
especially for Miss Adams.
Maude Fealy
Maude Fealy was a beautiful woman who
has been found on nearly 100 different
postcards . She is often pictured with a
strangely coiffed hairdo that includes ribbons,
ivy, or flowers, or wearing hats that were most
likely unique to her – although copied by many.
Researching Ms. Fealy has not been easy. Thumbnail bios and lists of character roles are about the limit of
what is available.
From the little we know Maude Fealy was born in
Memphis, Tennessee, on March 4, 1883. Maude’s mother
was an actress in many local theatre organizations and just
after Maude’s birth moved to Denver, Colorado.
Maude’s first professional roles came in children’s
plays at age 14. From her association with theatre agent
Augustin Daly, Maude was signed to a five year contract
and for the best part of those years she served as the
leading lady to the then leading man William Gillette.
After a somewhat stormy period in her career Maude
moved to England where she found much success in a
company led by Edward S. Willard. Her now starring-roles
brought much attention from the critics and even though
she was doing mostly substitute work – taking the roles
once popularized by Ellen Terry – she managed to find
most of her success working with Sir Henry Irving.
By early 1903, Maude decided to return
to America and make a second attempt at a
Broadway career, but the fates did not smile
on her and she played only in summer stock
productions. In 1906 she returned to her
home town and within a year was married to
Louis E. Sherwin, a drama critic working for
the Denver Republican. Due to her mother’s
meddling in their lives, the marriage lasted
only two years.
From 1914 through the late 1950s
Maude worked mainly in films and had parts
in many Cecil B. DeMille pictures including
the 1956 epic The Ten Commandments.
Fealy died in her sleep on November 9,
1971. She is interred at the Hollywood
Memorial Park Cemetery Mausoleum, close
by her mother's remains. Her final expenses
were provided for by a provision in the will of
Cecil B. DeMille who had died in 1959. No
close relatives survive her.