A postcard or post card is a rectangular piece of thick paper or thin cardboard intended for writing and mailing without an envelope. Shapes other than rectangular may also be used. There are novelty exceptions, such as wood postcards, made of thin wood, and copper postcards sold in the Copper Country of the U.S. state of Michigan, and coconut "postcards" from tropical islands.
Deltiology is the study and collection of postcards. Professor Randall Rhoades of Ashland, Ohio, coined a word in 1945 that became the accepted description of the study of picture postcards. It initially took about 20 years for the name to appear in a dictionary. Compared to philately, the identification of a postcard's place and time of production can often be an impossible task because postcards, unlike stamps, are produced in a decentralised, unregulated manner. For this reason, some collectors choose to limit their acquisitions to cards by specific artists and publishers, or by time and location.
The Rock Island Depot and Freight House is a two-story railroad station and adjacent one-story freight house from the turn of the 20th century. It was constructed in 1899 directly besides the Illinois River in the American city of Peoria, Illinois. The depot and freight house are Peoria's last remaining historic reminders of the importance of railroading in the city's past. The depot was built by the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad as the terminus of a major branch line that delivered significant goods and passengers to Peoria. The 1900 opening of the depot was attended by "throngs of populous;" at its height before the depression of the 1880s, Peoria was a transportation hub. The station's clock tower was removed in 1939. The buildings were listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1978. The last Rock Island train out of the station was the Peoria Rocket in 1978, of the company's Rock Island Rockets series.
Pullman National Monument, also known as The Pullman District and Pullman Historic District, is located in Chicago and was the first model, planned industrial community in the United States. The district had its origins in the manufacturing plans and organization of the Pullman Company, and became one of the most famous company towns in the United States, as well as the scene of the violent 1894 Pullman strike. It was built for George Pullman as a place to produce the famous Pullman sleeping cars.
The Robert S. Abbott House is a historic house at 4742 South Martin Luther King Jr. Drive in the Grand Boulevard community area of Chicago, Illinois. Built about 1900, it was home from 1926 until his death of Robert S. Abbott (1870-1940), founder and publisher of the Chicago Defender, the largest-circulation African-American newspaper in the nation. About started this newspaper in 1905 in which he heartened blacks in southern United States to move into north far from racist south. Abbott became one of the few self-made black millionaires in the early 20th century. His home was designated a National Historic Landmark status in 1976.
South Loop Printing House District is a historic district in the downtown Chicago Loop area of Chicago, Illinois. The district is roughly bounded by Congress, Polk, State, Taylor, and Wells Streets and includes 28 contributing buildings. The district includes many of the printing buildings used by Chicago's printing industry, the largest in the midwest from the 1880s through the 1930s. Due to its proximity to Dearborn Station and its thin property blocks that allowed for tall and thin printing buildings, land in the district was attractive to large printing companies. The district includes a small number of large and detailed buildings and many more small, homogenous buildings used by less prominent printing firms.
The Hotel Kewanee is a former hotel in downtown Kewanee, Illinois, located at 125 North Chestnut Street.
The Geiser Grand Hotel is a historic hotel in Baker City, Oregon, that opened in 1889. It received a restoration and reopened in 1993 after closing in 1968. Decorations include mahogany columns up to a high ceiling, Victorian-style chandeliers, and a stained glass ceiling. It was known as "the Queen of the Mines" during Gold Rush times and described as being the finest hotel between Portland, Oregon and Salt Lake City with the third elevator built west of the Mississippi River.
Stanley A. Piltz was a California photographer and publisher of Mid-Century Modern graphic design and printed ephemera. Stanley A. Piltz Company, San Francisco, issued many Linen Type postcards from the 1930s to the 1950s, depicting scenes of California, especially of the San Francisco Bay Area and the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition. They consisted primarily of scenic views, city, town, civil and military infrastructures and national monuments views. Linen Type postcards were produced on paper with a high rag content which gave the postcard a fabric type look and feel. At the time this was an inexpensive process. Along with advances in printing technique, linen type cards allowed for vibrant ink colors. Stanley Piltz pioneered the Linen Type postcards with his "Pictorial Wonderland Art Tone Series".
Lake County Discovery Museum is an interactive museum of history, art, and popular culture located in Libertyville, Illinois. The museum was established in 1976 in Wauconda, IL and sited in Lakewood Forest Preserve as part of the larger Lake County Forest Preserve District. It was later moved to Libertyville, IL. The museum is dedicated to collecting, preserving, and presenting the history and culture of Lake County, Illinois. The museum houses among its collections the Curt Teich Postcard Archives, the largest public collection of postcards in the United States.
The Alfred Bersbach House is a John S. Van Bergen-designed house in Wilmette, Illinois. Built in 1915, it is reflective of the Prairie School approach to house architecture. Architectural historian Carl W. Condit and others considered the house to be Van Bergen's masterpiece.
Burton Frasher was an American photographer and publisher of mid-century modern ephemera. His black-and-white landscape photographs of the American West have been widely reproduced.
The Produce Terminal Cold Storage Company Building is a historic refrigerated warehouse at 1550 South Blue Island Avenue in the Near West Side neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. Built in 1928-29, the warehouse was the largest cold storage facility in Chicago when it opened. As Chicago was a major shipping and transportation hub, refrigerated storage played a key role in preserving perishable goods so they could be sold year-round. Architects H. Peter Henschien, a renowned designer of refrigerated facilities, and Robert J. McLaren designed the Art Deco building. The top two stories of the eleven-story building feature extensive terra cotta and tile ornamentation, including chevrons, Egyptian-inspired colonettes, and a dentillated cornice with cymatium molding. In addition to its extensive refrigerated space, the interior plan also included processing and office space, improving efficiency and lowering costs for the building's tenants.
The Illinois Envelope Co. Building is a former industrial structure located at 400 Bryant Street in Kalamazoo, Michigan. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983. In 2018, the building became the home of the Kalamazoo County Health and Community Services Department.
The Creamery Package Manufacturing Company Building is a historic building at 1245 W. Washington Boulevard in the Near West Side neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. Built in 1926, the building served as the headquarters for the Creamery Package Manufacturing Company, which was formed in 1887. The architecture firm of Gardner & Lindberg designed the three-story Colonial Revival building. The Creamery Package Manufacturing Company produced processing equipment and other goods for the dairy industry, which had a large presence in and around Chicago in the early 20th century. The company is representative of Chicago's significant food processing industry; the city's position as a transportation hub meant processing companies could quickly send their goods to larger customers in the food industry. The Creamery Package Manufacturing Company used the building until the 1970s.
The Medical Arts Building is an Art Deco office building at 715 Lake Street, Oak Park, Illinois. It is a contributing property to the Ridgeland–Oak Park Historic District. At 122 feet, it was the tallest building in Oak Park for several decades after it was built.
Old Main is a historic building on the campus of North Park University in Chicago, Illinois. Built in 1893-94, it is the oldest building at the university, which was known as Swedish Evangelical Mission Covenant College at the time. Contractor J.A. Modin built the Georgian Revival building, which features a prominent cupola atop its roof. The building became a symbol of both the university itself and the surrounding Swedish-American neighborhood, as the college was a Swedish-American institution attended by Swedes throughout the country. It also hosted the Evangelical Covenant Church's Annual Meeting in its early years; at the time, the church was closely affiliated with the Swedish-American community.
The Northwestern Terra Cotta Company Building is a historic building at 1701-1711 W. Terra Cotta Place in the Lincoln Park neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. Constructed in 1905, the building housed the offices for the Northwestern Terra Cotta Company's terra cotta production plant. In the early twentieth century, terra cotta was a popular decorative building material in both Chicago and the country as a whole; the newly developed Chicago school of architecture in particular used terra cotta extensively. The Northwestern Terra Cotta Company was one of the leading national producers of the material, and its terra cotta was used in Chicago architectural landmarks such as the Rookery Building, the Wrigley Building, and the Sullivan Center. The plant closed in 1932 and has been largely demolished, leaving the office building as its only major remnant.
