Proto-Post Cards

[porphyry]

I only realized today that there was some appetite on our friends list for these sorts of pictures, so here are some photos from before the Franco-Prussian War. A bit early for postcards, but the same genre.

Roger Fenton 1858

From LJ

Felix Nadar (Gaspard-Felix Tournachon) 1856

From LJ

Soudaneesse ca. 1870

From LJ

If you want to click through to the host and download, the original scans are quite large.

Comments

[benicek.livejournal.com]

What else have you got? Post more!

[malkhos.livejournal.com]

Oh, you don't know what you;re asking. I have thousands of them.

Actually I was once virtually employed to edit a website devoted to French Postcards. Right after the negotiations were finalized, I gt an e-mail from the [Dutch] owner. "You don't know how people hate the Dutch--how they taunt me that I'm only living by bureaucratic subsidy."

To which I replied, "Yes that must be terrible, I'm sure there is as much industry and initiative in the Netherlands as anywhere else."

To which he replied, "Forget about working here, you Dutch hating Bastard! You're blocked from the site too!"

Probably just as well not to work for crazy people.

I could think about making a post like this a weekly feature, though.

[benicek.livejournal.com]

Ha! The people who run the Dutch windmill database are far more sane.

As you may have noticed, I'm a bit obsessed with vintage photos. I've sort of taken over the foundphoto group on Livejournal.