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Springfield, Abraham Lincoln’s Tomb (Illinois)
For some reason, we have four of these unused, aging Curteichcolor cards 9C-K577. The caption makes the tomb sound like a monumental version of the Golden Gate Bridge: they start working on it, then when the work is finished, they start over again. Several of Lincoln’s family are interred there. Grades: 1
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Hyannis, Cape Cod, The Eternal Flame (Massachusetts, USA)
Unused card, with significant abrasions across the front. This commemorates President John F. Kennedy. Grade: 5
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I (heart) Obama (USA)
Mailed in 2013, with round Global Forever stamp, postmark, Air Mail sticker, and pasted address label. Grade: 3
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Biden President
We tried everything (and everyone) we knew, short of flying to the National Mall in Washington, to find a conventional Biden or Biden/Harris postcard. We know they’re out there, but the nation is now so polarized, we’re guessing retailers are afraid to try to sell them. And while this is the size and shape of a postcard, it is more of a promotional item pre-election, in return for someone having made a donation. That person wrote an additional message on the reverse. Until we can find the real thing, this will have to do. Grade: 4
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Prague, Woodrow Wilson Monument (Czech Republic)
We often need to be careful when we interpret old postcards, and here’s a case in point. Standing alone, it’s an unused sepia card captioned in four languages, very heavily aged and a small separation on the reverse upper right corner. It just says “The Wilson Monument” (in English) and someone long ago penciled “1920s” lightly on the reverse. But when we went to learn more, we came up with this online source dated 2011: “WASHINGTON, Sept. 12, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — Seventy years after its destruction by Nazi troops, a memorial statue honoring President Woodrow Wilson will return to its original location on Oct. 5 in Prague … The Wilson Monument commemorates the role that the former U.S. president played in helping the Czech people achieve independence in 1918 …” So there! Grade: 4
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James Knox Polk
… and wife, on this unused old Foto Tone card. Polk was the 11th president and, buried in his Wikipedia entry, receives this faint praise: “Though relatively obscure today, scholars have ranked Polk favorably for his ability to achieve the major items on his presidential agenda despite limiting himself to a single term. He has also been criticized for leading the country into an aggressive war against Mexico and thus exacerbating divides between free and slave states. A property owner who used slave labor, he kept a plantation in Mississippi and increased his slave ownership during his presidency. The legacy of Polk’s policy of territorial expansion – with the United States reaching the Pacific coast – made the United States a nation poised to become a world power, but with sectional divisions gravely exacerbated, setting the stage for the Civil War. ” Grade: 1
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George H.W. Bush
… along with his wife Barbara. This Bush was #41 and took office in January 1989. Unused card. Grade: 1
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Dwight Eisenhower and Richard Nixon
We’re never certain with “Don Bartels color reproduction” cards what it is we’re getting, but this is an old card now, unused, and beginning to age. As for that slogan, it’s fine to trust in God but, as it turned out, not so much in Nixon. Grade: 1
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William Henry Harrison
He’s the one who caught pneumonia during or shortly after his inauguration and who died on his 32nd day in office. We’re friends with a very distant descendant of his, and the two look nothing alike. Unused, embossed, undivided back card. Grade: 1
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George W. Bush
The second President Bush, with his wife Laura. Unused card that actually is highlighting the family compound in Kennebunkport, Maine. Grade: 1
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Ulysses S. Grant
This is an unused 1992 postcard from the Smithsonian Institution’s National Portrait Gallery, of an 1865 oil painting by Ole Peter Hansen Balling. Grant was the 18th U.S. President. Grade: 1
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James Buchanan
Apparently a well-educated person, nevertheless this 15th President is widely rated as one of the worst. He might have averted the U.S. Civil War, but didn’t. Unused card. Grade: 1
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Official Photographs of Mount Rushmore (set) (South Dakota, USA)
Several cautions for you here, so please note: our scan shows you the somewhat tattered front paper cover of this set. It says there are nine photos. *BUT* the set had been opened long ago, and re-sealed itself, and we cannot and would not guarantee all nine photos are there. We’re certain there are more than one. And we take them at their word that these are “photos” and may not be postcards at all. With all that out of the way, this is definitely old and we like the instruction they provide, that this was produced “to further a correct interpretation of this Memorial”. (How could it be misinterpreted? That the four Presidents were Buchanan, Harding, Tyler, and Fillmore?) We will assign Grade: 2
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Ulysses S. Grant: Rosalie (Natchez, Mississippi)
Unused Curteich-Chicago card 2A-359N, whose brief caption is cleverly descriptive and mentions General Grant’s role (he was to become U.S. President). Very minor foxing on reverse. Grade: 2
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Harry S Truman
Even Wikipedia gets it wrong sometimes, explaining the origin of Truman’s middle initial “S” but then placing a dot after it in their headline. (There shouldn’t be.) Anyway, the headline photo on this unused contemporary card may be one of the most famous shots in U.S. journalistic history, since as the world knows by now, Dewey did not defeat Truman. How sweet that moment must have been. Grade: 1
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Quincy, Birthplaces of two presidents (Massachusetts)
As the caption reveals, U.S. president John Quincy Adams was born in the house on the left, and John Adams in the one on the right. This is an old card, not postally used but with a long-ago message about card swaps on the reverse. Grade: 3
