The Happy Invention: History & Significance of Picture Postcards

Program Type:

History

Age Group:

Adults
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Program Description

Event Details

In America, the first picture postcards were printed for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago —making Illinois the birthplace of the American picture postcard. Since those flowery Victorian originals, uncountable billions of postcards of every aspect of life have been printed, depicting train stations and bandstands, street views and cartoons, ads for products and services, ‘beauties’ and ‘freaks,’ social history both whimsical and dark, and everything in between. In this presentation, Katherine Hamilton-Smith, the founding curator of the Curt Teich Postcard Archives, the world's largest collection of postcards at the Newberry Library, presents their documentary power and significance.

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This is a virtual event hosted on Zoom.

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