Last year I was gifted a pile of vintage postcards, all of which depicted the sights of London. I came across them again last week when tidying my office space before taking photos and remembered that I'd never shared the mystery found within the vintage postcards. When first looking through them, I turned each one over to read the description and tourist information, trying to find a print date (none available) and was really surprised to see that one was handwritten, stamped and postmarked. It had actually been sent to someone.
Postmarked Wimbledon, 9.45am, 17 JLY 1962, SW19
(and a stamp that was 2½ pence)
I was really sorry to hear the news on your P.C. Tried to phone you last night but no reply. How is the job going? and how about popping in one night (not Thurs or Sat). Do give me a ring. Love Audrey
Sent to
Miss V. G. Hawtin
54 Leopold Road
Wimbledon
SW19
Doesn't it sound remarkable that someone would send a postcard to another person even though they live in the same area? I started to fantasise about who the two people were; maybe mother and daughter but then why would she sign off as "Audrey"? What does "P.C." stand for in the pre-computer days that this postcard was sent? Did the picture of the open Tower Bridge have meaning or was it just that it was a choice between spare postcard instead of a notelet to send a quick note.
This very much has a 'message in a bottle' feel to it. Wouldn't it be wonderful to track down the sender and the recipient?
It also got me thinking about our lines of communication today. I'm more inclined to send someone a text or a message via Facebook than write them a note. Do we spend as much time tweeting and emailing our friends as our modern ancestors spent writing letters to their nearest and dearest? I don't think we share written correspondence as much as we should and when I received an actual postcard from Tanya in July I realised that I need to be more proactive with this myself. So all those little notelets and one-off cards from stationery boxes that I've saved for 'a special occasion' are going to get an airing and I'm going to start sending messages to friends... just because I can.
