There were over three hundred letters just between my mother-in-law and her future husband. I arranged the batch in chronological order in the months after they came into my hands. My husband read through them, learning about his parents in a way that he hadn't while they were alive. They were divorced not long after he was born, having been separated for a while before that, and it was a good opportunity for him to learn about his family. I have kept only two of those letters; one marked the beginning and letter number 90. [A few days after writing this: I found Letter 386 in another pile, so I have three of the hundreds between the two correspondents!]
I also have letters written from one family member to another. They did a lot of round-robin letters. One sister was overseas for many years, one nearby with parents living there also, and my mother-in-law here in the city.
Mail, in the days when these cards were sent, was delivered - or at least available for pick-up - several times a day. I know this because some of the letters note that my mother-in-law had been to the train station several times in one day to put a letter in the mail bag or to check for incoming mail. Small towns; plenty of trains to carry the mail; even more efficient, I think, than e-mail today.
Back to the postcards: I wish they could easily be sent today to arrive in good condition. Most that I've sent in the last few years have been damaged by running them through machines that either tear the card or print those bar codes across the front. Arrgh!
Here are the ones I saved, earliest to most recent.
One of the things I find most interesting about paper correspondence of any kind is that it helps me track where people were and when they were there.
This Oregon postcards is from 1909. The Lane family travelled from Iowa to Seattle, Washington that year and attended the World's Fair. Golly gee whiz. I wonder if they went by train or drove? (Yes, I have plenty of photos of Ancient Automobiles with family members either in them or beside them.)
Lova, the sender, is the granddaughter of Deborah Berry, to whom the card is addressed. The address says in care of H B Duncan, which tells me that Deborah could be living with her daughter's family - Deborah was 74 years old that year. But both the 1900 and 1910 census records show her living in Kansas, the earlier one with a son, the later one with another daughter. So she was more likely visiting, even if for an extended visit, with her daughter in Lineville, Iowa.
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This Thanksgiving Greetings card is dated November 1910 and came from Clio, Wayne Co, Iowa, to Parkman, Ellis Co, Oklahoma. For One Cent. And arrived in good condition. [Wear is from age.]
The sender is James Henry Greer, father of Alta Greer Berry. It's interesting that there's corn on the front - it is from Iowa - and J H mentions the corn crop. If I remember correctly, this is the only correspondence I found from Alta's father.
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Card says March the 16, 1910 / in memory of your / 31 birthday / Mary Greer / to Alta Berry. What a beautiful card it is. If you can't tell from the photo, it is an embossed front, backed by a second protective paper. Make in Germany, so it says. It looks as though it was not sent through the post office since there is no mailing address and the stamp square seems untouched. Perhaps it was included in a letter. The uncovered corner lets us look at the rates for the time.
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This card was sent in 1911 to Conda Berry, the oldest son of Alta and J O, who died when he was not quite 11 years old. The newspaper notice about his death is included in this article. Loren was only 5 years old at the time of this card, (Conda was about 6 years old), so it's not much of a guess that Loren's mother did the writing. Loren lived in Hardtner, Kansas, just north of the Oklahoma border. Conda in Ellis Co, Oklahoma. Quite a distance, but easily bridged by the Post Office - and for only a penny.
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J O had ordered onion sets from this company in Nebraska. I don't know why he couldn't get onion sets locally, but if he had, there wouldn't be this very nice postcard. What a good way to do business. These are people I would want to buy from.
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A Thanksgiving Greeting from J O Berry to his mother Deborah Berry. This is 1911 and the address is Soldier, Jackson Co, Kansas, where she's living with youngest daughter Viola "Ola" and family. Oatis invites his mother to come for Thanksgiving. I wonder if she came? The card has a light embossing, as can be seen from the back, but not nearly as deep as the Daughter card above. Post cards could be pretty fancy in those days.
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This 1912 card is certainly not the prettiest one in the bunch, but it does, once again, show the distances people travelled in the early part of that century. It says Halsey, Oregon, September 16, 12, once again from Cousin Loren to his cousin Conda, both only a year older than the first card I've posted.
The information on the card logs a long time of travel. The family left Pond Creek, Oklahoma, early in July, stayed 6 weeks in Colorado, on to Oregon where the note says that they haven't decided where to stay for the winter. They will return to Pond Creek the last of October after a trip to the Coast first. That's a lot of travel for a farmer, which is how Loren's father is listed on the census records. More wondering on my part.
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Thursday, December 21, 1916, Alta writes husband J O Berry from Clio, Iowa. Her parents were alive and well at that time. She had three children at home, the youngest not even two years old. I wonder what took her to Iowa just before Christmas.
The card says "it was 20 below this morning", and mentions Uncle George Smith. He's one of my mysteries in this family. Alta's mother had two brothers and a sister. I know very little about any of the three, even though I have a huge portrait of them on my wall. I've started with the oldest brother and have written about my recent trip to Kansas in search of information about him. When I run out of luck with John, George will be my next investigation, then the other girl in the family, Susan.
Still one cent stamp; still arrived in good condition. Sigh . . .
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It's 1922 and The Folks have moved from the farm in Ellis County, into the town of Vici in Dewey Co, Oklahoma. J O's younger sister, Viola, in Kansas, wishes him a Merry Christmas.
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This is a giant jump through time. Clear up to 1960. And look at that postage stamp - a whopping 3 Cents! - to get from Missouri to Oklahoma City. Both J O and Alta died in 1961 and yet here they are in 1960 travelling from Chickasha where they lived, to the Missouri Ozarks.
James Oatis "Oatis" or "Oat" Berry and Alta Greer Berry
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And so ends my postal journey through time . . .
