Inheriting history

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Collecting postcards is an activity I came by honestly; at the turn of the 20th century my family sent a lot of them, and being the only child of an only child of an only child, the folder of cards written between my grandmother and her sisters and brothers landed with me. It was the text messaging of the early 1900s, written on the back of random bits of card, posted at 4pm, arriving at 10am the next day. Many were a ha'penny way of telling my great grandmother what time they would arrive for lunch on their day off from whatever stately home they were working in at the time. Young and poor, reuniting with their parents and siblings for modest home food and catching up on the news of everyone in their village was something to look forward to, after the hard drudgery of the rest of the week.

I realised quickly that there are several million more messages out there, scribbled in pencil on beautiful cards, whacky, saucy and strange cards, all building a picture of a time which is long gone, a pace and quality of life before the Great War, the likes of which we will not see again. Amongst my grandmother's correspondence was a photo card of a young man in uniform from her village. I believe he may have been a sweetheart, but he didn't return from the War, and that left my grandmother unmarried until she was into her 30s, and then she married a younger man. There were so few men left of that generation. 

So the messages act like subtitles on a jerky, silent black and white film. We read something and for a brief moment a person sparks to life. Someone long gone, perhaps remembered, perhaps not.

I am adding cards to my collection of the various places around the world where I have lived and worked, and those too will feature in this blog. I will also list cards for sale.

Thanks for joining me on my journey



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