103 Years Ago

After looking at the picture on the front of this post card, then reading the title of it here on the back of the card, I was mortified. I do remember when people in the United States of African heritage were called "boys". It was not a complimentary term, either. And then, to read that these two are on a handcar on a track that goes through Colony No. 1,

I thought that this was the lowest anyone could go after the Civil War.

OK, I was wrong. Not about it being the lowest anyone could go, but I was wrong in my 21st century interpretation of what I was reading. "FARMER BOYS" was a movement begun by Will B. Otwell in Carlinville, Illinois.

It was like a predecessor to the 4-H club movement. He sponsored agricultural contests among the boys who lived on the farms. At first the competitions were just local. Will B. Otwell had been active in the Macoupin County (Illinois) Farmers' Institute from the beginning in 1898. As a local nurseryman, he was elected secretary of the group in February of 1898. For their first Institute day, held later that same month, the officers engaged speakers of state-wide reputation to talk on farm subjects. Otwell promoted the institute extensively, advertising in 13 county papers and instructed the janitor of the courthouse to open the doors early to accommodate the crowd. But when the doors of the courthouse opened, the only ones to enter the hall were the officers and the chaplain. A couple of years later he decided to do something grand to promote the event. First, he wrote to leading corn growers in Iowa, Indiana, and Illinois and procured 12 samples of first-class seed corn. He then called 12 farmers into the parlors of a local bank and asked them to select the variety best adapted to the soil of Macoupin county. This done, he bought several bushels of the seed corn at $2 per bushel. Next, he solicited $40 in cash and divided it into $1 premiums. A plow company gave a two-horse plow for a sweepstakes premium. Otwell then published a notice in the county papers that every boy under 18 who would send in his name and address would receive a package of seed corn - all that could be mailed for one cent postage. The response was considerable; 500 young boys requested seed corn for the contest and during the summer these youthful contestants advertised the forthcoming Farmers' Institute as no other medium could have done. By 1901 Otwell's annual corn growing contest had attracted 1,500 boys. Soon equipment manufacturers offered premiums to contest winners: a three-wheeled riding plow, a walking cultivator, fanning mill, a high-grade bicycle, a double harrow, a washing machine, a one-hole corn sheller, a box of 100 bars of soap, and even a windmill. The attendance in 1901 set a record and that of 1902 surpassed it, with the result that Otwell and his county Institute became known all over the state of Illinois. Eventually, he opened his contest up to all farm children in Illinois. Then he opened it up to the a wider audience and eventually he opened it up to the entire United States. You can find more about this story at http://4-hhistorypreservation.com/History/4-H_Promotion/Single_Story.asp?ps=38

AND.... it turns out that the Colony No. 1 is one of many real estate ventures that Will Otwell undertook with a partner. Wow!! Was I ever wrong. A good lesson to learn here for me.

One Hundred and Eight Years Ago

From Wikipedia: The Grand Trunk Railway (reporting mark GT) was a railway system that operated in the Canadian provinces of Quebec and Ontario, and in the American states of Connecticut, Maine, Michigan, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont. The railway was operated from headquarters in Montreal, Quebec, with corporate headquarters in London, England (4 Warwick House Street). It cost an estimated $160 million to build. The Grand Trunk, its subsidiaries, and the Canadian Government Railways were precursors of today's Canadian National Railways.

The Grand Trunk station was a historic railroad station in Hamilton, Ontario, which was located on Stuart Street, at the beginning of Caroline Street North. In 1885, an effort was made to beautify the area to the east of the station itself with ornamental gardens. The embankment along Stuart Street provided an opportunity to let passengers passing by to know exactly what city they were in, with the word "Hamilton" written with white stones. You can see this on the embankment to the left of the station and below the white building with the red roof.

The message is Marjorie telling her cousin, Florence, that all is well and that she was the housekeeper while her mother and Martha went to Detroit over Easter. The publisher of the post card, W.G. MacFarland, was a very active post card publisher. If you search for the name you will find quite the number of results, including pictures of his post cards.

110 Years Ago Today

When the railroad was built, the Dollarhide family owned the Siskiyou Pass wagon road, which became the Pacific Highway, U.S. Highway 99, and Interstate 5 later. They also owned a sawmill, for which they had originally purchased this right of way. The material for the pictured trestle came out of the nearby Dollarhide Sawmill, and Southern Pacific therefore named it "Dollarhide Trestle". Like all the wooden trestles along the Siskiyou Pass route, it was filled with rock and soil later, and is a dam today. On some maps, the location is still called "Dollarhide Curve". The nearby settlement "Dollarhide" has been abandoned, like most of the small settlements along the railroad pass route.
It must be a very steep grade. There are two engines at the front of this train and one at the back, pushing. The Oregon & California Railroad proposed an alternate route for the Oregon and California rail connection, which would have avoided Siskiyou Pass. However, Oregon politicians decided in favor of the present rail route. When Tunnel 13 was completed in 1887, beneath the Siskiyou Pass, there was finally a rail link between Oregon and California. In the 1920s, the Southern Pacific Railroad constructed the Natron Cutoff, a faster, cheaper route between the two states.

The message on the back is simply letting someone know that the writer arrived in Salem, Oregon safely and that the weather was much better than she expected.

81 Years Od Today

There is so much to say about this post card.... Because the title on the front of the card claims that it is "The Steepest Railway in the World" we should check on that. The rails are 1,550 feet long from top to bottom of the canyon. For 100 per cent of the ride the rails are set at a 45 degree angle. That sounds like the steepest Railway in the world to me - - - at least back on June 14, 1931 (not quite 6 years before this post card was mailed) when it was dedicated. If you search on line for the world's steepest railway today, you will find that it is, of course, in Switzerland. It is certainly steeper than this railway is today - it no longer exists. It was destroyed beyond repair by a fire in June of 2013. That was the same month as its 82nd birthday. The incline railway was owned by the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad. You can see that when we turn the card over:

The purple circular stamp in the top, middle says, "The top of the world Tennessee Pass Colorado" at the bottom of the circle it has the letters: "D. & G. R. W. Rail..." It also tells you that you are a the 10,242 foot elevation mark (not quite 2 miles above sea level. On left side of the card we see that it was published by the Interstate Company out of Denver. Van Noy Railway Hotel and News began a series of mergers and acquisitions in 1914, starting with the Brown News Company (also headquartered in Kansas City) which was acquired on October 1, 1914 being operated as Van Noy News. In 1915, the Company began consolidating operations with the New York City based Interstate News Company. The company name was changed to Van Noy-Interstate News Company in 1917, but the company headquarters remained in Kansas City under the leadership of Ira C. Van Noy. As a result of changes in railroad passenger train service, Van Noy Interstate began to focus more on the hotel side of their operations. In 1922, the Company acquired the Gem Fountain Company, and in 1926 the company began operating as the Interstate Company.
The line down the center of the card indicates that it was printed by the H. H. Tammen Curio Company. A novelty dealer and important publisher of national view-cards and Western themes in continuous tone and halftone lithography. Their logo does not appear on all their cards but other graphic elements are often remain the same. H. H. Tammen (1856-1924) Harry Heye Tammen was born in Baltimore, Maryland on March 6, 1856, the son of a German immigrant pharmacist. He attended Knapps Academy in Baltimore, then worked in Philadelphia before moving to Denver in 1880. Tammen also manufactured a very popular line of "Colorado curiosities" and "mineral novelties" consusting of a variety of numbered and identified Colorado mineral and ore specimens cemented onto clocks, caskets, inkstands (one of which won an award at the 1881 Colorado State Fair), centerpieces, crosses, horseshoes and so on for ornamental purposes. He described these items as "perfect in taste, blending of colors, etc., and absolutely trustworthy as regards the cataloguing, classification and specifications of the different minerals employed in the construction of each article." He also dealt in stereoscopic and other photos of the West (he was supplied by the famous Western photographer W.H. Jackson), photo albums, books on the West, silver souvenir spoons, a wide variety of humorous and scenic postcards (especially of mining areas), fossil fish, polished agates, botanical specimens, Pueblo Indian pottery, Tlingit Indian carvings, relics and taxidermy items from his stores in Denver.

115 Years Ago - Regarding a Bay Colt Horse

I know that the title of the blog says, "Bay Colt Horse" but that is not the subject of the picture on the post card. That is one of the topics in the message. This person is writing to George Cramer in Mapleton, Minnesota asking, "Have you driven your bay colt yet? He must be a dandy by this time." Mapleton is about 100 miles South-Southwest of Minneapolis. On Google maps it looks like it could still be farm country where they raise bay colts. Other interesting notes about the back of this post card:
1) The post card is published by Edward H. Mitchell from San Francisco. Edward H. Mitchell was one of the earliest and most prolific postcard publishers in the United States, and he was a San Franciscan. Cards bearing his name as publisher have been used, collected and studied since the end of the nineteenth century – the dawn of the Golden Age of Postcards. Several extensive checklists running to over three thousand entries have been compiled and updated. Mitchell published very early cards – colored vignettes – that were printed in Germany. He was publishing undivided back cards from a Post Street address before the earthquake and fire of 1906 destroyed his printing operation and much of San Francisco. He continued to work out of his home until he built a plant and warehouse on Army Street. From there he published thousands of divided back cards including many views of San Francisco and the West, series on the Philippines and the Hawaiian Islands, high quality real photo views, comics, artistic designs and a series of early exaggerations of California fruits and vegetables. He printed cards for himself and other publishers, most notably to promote the 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition. Collectors and researchers of all Mitchell cards cannot help but feel a personal link with the publisher because he identifies himself on each of them as “Edward H. Mitchell”–  not “... Company,” not “... Inc.” just Edward H. Mitchell.”
2) Contained in the postal cancellation is an advertisement for the upcoming WORLD'S PANAMA PACIFIC EXPOSITION IN SAN FRANCISCO IN 1915. It was ostensibly advertised as a celebration of the that fact that the recently opened Panama Canal would connect the Pacific world to the rest of the world through the canal. Being a train post card blog spot, I have to mention that the C. P. Huntington, the first steam locomotive purchased for the Southern Pacific Railroad, was included in the exhibits.
3) If you look carefully at the cancellation mentioned in number 2, above, the I in SAN FRANCISCO is spelled with an exclamation mark !

I do not know how intentional that is. I can find no references to it on line or in any of the books that I have. I do know that the city had experienced a devastating earthquake less than a decade earlier and they were excited to show the world how they had recovered. Maybe this was a hint.

The picture on the front of this post card is from a mountain in the range that surrounds Las Angeles, California. I have written about Mt. Lowe before in this blog. That is the San Gabriel valley in the background. In order to get to this point in the Mount Lowe experience the riders would have taken a Pacific Electric trolley from Los Angeles to the base of the mountain. Then they took an incline railroad very nearly straight up the side of the mountain where they would then transfer to this trolley, which would then take them through the Granite Gate, across Las Flores Canyon and around the circular bridge in order to get to the Inn at the top of the mountain. Unfortunately, today there is very little that remains of this marvel. You can read more about Mt. Lowe here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Lowe_Railway