| Pre-Postcard Era
1840 - 1869
Before postcards came the lithograph prints, woodcuts and small cards that were the predecessor of the "mailed" postcard. They were primarily hand delivered. Another direct ancestor seems to be the envelopes printed with pictures on them. These first envelopes were produced by D. William Mulready, E.R.W. Hume, Dickey Doyle, and James Valentine.
The private postal card was developed by John P. Charlton of Philadelphia in 1861 for which he obtained the copyright which was later transferred to H.L. Lipman. The cards were adorned with a small border and labeled "Lipman's Postal Card, Patent Applied For". They were on the market until 1873 when the first Government Postcards appeared.
Plain postcards were used prior to the Lipman postcard and were issued by individual countries with that country's stamp affixed upon them. These cards were referred to as "Postals".
The first "non-Postal" postcard, meaning a privately made postcard where postage had to be affixed was introduced in Austria in 1869 and by 1870, picture postcards were all the rage! |