Postcard History

Imagine you’re a postcard publisher in the Pacific Northwest in the early 1900s. You have thousands of geographic images ranging from the salmon canneries in Astoria, Oregon, to the wheat fields of the Palouse in eastern Washington, and many scenes in between. What you don’t have are holiday images. You don’t have those ever-popular Christmas postcards.

How can you tap into that large holiday postcard market? How about using a geographic postcard image you already own, reduce that image in size and fancy up the rest of the postcard with holiday greetings and what looks like a version of clip art from that time? What you end with is a recycled postcard image gussied up to now serve as a Christmas/New Years postcard. You own the original scenic postcards you sold to drug stores and other retail outlets. Now, you turn around and sell this image again to retailers but repackaged as a Christmas postcard. Pretty clever.

Charles Wesley Andrews was born in Aurora, Ontario, Canada in 1875. He moved to Baker City, the county seat of Baker County in northeast Oregon, where he gained notoriety as a postcard publisher, photographer, printer and recorder of Pacific Northwest history. He was involved with establishing the Oregon Trail Association and published the Morning Democrat, a Baker City newspaper. He photographed and published thousands of images of Idaho, Washington, Oregon, and Yellowstone. In 1929 he moved his photo-studio to Portland Oregon where he resided until his death in 1950.

It can’t be said what Wesley Andrews was thinking when he created this style of postcard, but from a different perspective it looks like this was what Andrews and a few other west coast postcard publishers did to get in on the Christmas postcard frenzy. Many of these postcards are hand tinted. The printing method is rotogravure, a rotary printing press process. As mentioned, the surrounding artwork reminds us of clip art, with traditional Christmas themes such as holly, mistletoe, bells, and more – that being, interesting but non-traditional images such as Native Americans, cowboys, state flowers and seagulls.

Much of Andrews’ glass slides, postcards and other images, his personal and business papers, scrapbooks, and other information are preserved in archives at the Oregon Historical Society Research Library, Archives West; an Orbis Cascade Alliance, Newspapers.com, and Oregon Genealogy.com. His contribution to the historical record of the Northwest is priceless. That he created these charming Christmas postcards is just a nice, unexpected bonus.

There are several Pacific Northwest Christmas postcard images throughout this article. Two special postcards are decorated with the same Native American children with an inset postcard image.

Above (left) the Wesley Andrews postcard features the “Yakima Indians in full Dress.” (Right) This is a rare Christmas postcard using the same holiday format. The inset features the San Xavier Mission and Grotto at Tucson, Arizona. “The Albertype Co., Brooklyn NY” is printed in the stamp box. The Wesley Andrews is postmarked from Toppenish, Washington, 1912; the Tucson postcard is unused. Both postcards have “Copyright A. Wittemann Brooklyn NY” in the lower left corner. Adolph and Herman Wittemann founded the Albertype Company in 1890. The Tucson postcard has “Publ by R. Rasmessan” in the lower right corner. Rasmessan was a curio dealer who had a small store on Main Street in downtown Tucson.

The surrounding artwork was often used over and over again with different geographic images. Some additional West Coast postcard publishers who used this Christmas postcard style were James Lowman, who bought out a bookstore in 1882, and by 1885 he had partnered with a Mr. Hanford to start the Lowman and Hanford Stationery and Printing Company. Their business burned in the 1889 Great Seattle Fire but was rebuilt and continued to exist up to 2006.

For some of my college years, in the early 1970s I worked in downtown Seattle. I would take the bus from the University of Washington to work and often would visit bookstores, stationary stores and window shops before my daily part time job at the King County Medical Society Library. Consequently, I remember this company. I had no money to buy anything, but it was fun to look at all that gorgeous paper!

Edwin Patton started his photography studio in Salem in 1908 and it included the largest postcard store in the Pacific Northwest. Many of the real photo postcards of western Oregon were part of his collection. The primary photographer for Patton, Eugene Lavalieur acquired the business in 1918, renaming it the Pacific Photo Company. In the 1920s, the photo negatives and equipment were sold to Wesley Andrews.

The Portland Post Card Company began in 1905 by being the official producer of postcards for the Lewis and Clark Exposition in Portland. In 1909 they became the official postcard publisher at the Alaska Yukon Pacific Expo in Seattle.

J. K. Gill migrated to Oregon from England. He purchased a bookstore in Salem, sold it and moved to Portland where he also opened a bookstore. At one point there were almost 40 J. K. Gill stores in Oregon, Washington, California, and Arizona, selling office supplies, stationery, art supplies, maps, books, lithographs, sheet music, and postcards. The last store closed in 1999.

J. Scheff, J Sheff, I. Scheff or I. Sheff, take your pick. Each of these publisher credits were used for this San Francisco postcard publisher. The company began circa 1907, and was soon on the Christmas postcard bandwagon.

Richard Behrendt emigrated from Germany in 1877 to the U.S. He began an import and wholesale business in San Francisco in the 1880s, dealing in postcards and stereo views along with other items. He produced many postcards depicting the results of the 1906 Great San Francisco Earthquake. After his death in 1909 the family continued the business into the 1930s.

These unusual Christmas themed postcards caught my eye several years ago and it is always a surprise to run across new ones. We should thank Wesley Andrews for being the creator of these unique Christmas/New Years postcards and the other regional publishers who jumped on this bandwagon.  I think they are quite lovely and hope you enjoy them!