A Collection of Restored Images
from a Wonderful Era

The era of the postcard and view photography (as opposed to portraits) began in the very late 1800's. Postcards were first used in Europe and became a tremendous success. Travelers now had a way to send home beautiful colored images of their many destinations. It took a while for postcards to become popular, but once they did, the quantities produced were stunning by any measure. One company printed over 75 million cards in a year -- and there were several companies producing cards during the first decade of the 20th century. The sheer number of high-quality photographs taken in a period of just a handful of years is staggering, but it documents the period in the early 1900's in the U.S. and Canada very well.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postcard for more history of the postcard.

For more information on the various publishers of postcards, visit the excellent website by the Metropolitan Post Card Club of New York City.

For information on Canadian postcards, visit The Toronto Post Card Club.

The 1900px.com website is devoted to recognizing the photographers and their work from this period, especially cards produced by the Rotograph Company and its predecessor National Art Views Co., both from New York City, and the Hugh C. Leighton Co. and its successors from Portland Maine.

We have produced checklists of cards produced by some of the companies, and also a number of slide shows with a collection of their work. Every attempt has been made to credit the publisher and/or photographer, but unfortunately there are many that are unknown.

Note that this website is a work in progress and material will be added from time to time. The images have been restored as much as is reasonably possible to bring out their original colors and to remove blemishes, scratches, etc. (The images were taken, of course, as black and white photographs, and later colored by the publisher who worked from written instructions from the photographer. Most of the coloring from this period (c. 1905 - 1912) was expertly done and makes for pleasing images. However it is important to note that the coloring is an artistic enhancement to the image and may not reflect the actual colors.)

Publishers of Postcards

A.C. Bosselman & Co. (New York)

Detroit Photographic Co. (see Detroit Publishing Co.)

Detroit Publishing Co. (Detroit)

Eastern Ilustrating & Publishing Co. (Belfast, Maine)

Hugh C. Leighton Co. (Portland, Maine)

Leighton & Valentine Co. -- See Hugh C. Leighton Co.

G.W. Morris Co. (Portland, Maine)

National Art Views Co. (New York)

The Rotograph Co. (New York)

William D. Taylor (Northville, New York)

Raphael Tuck & Sons (London)-- Article on TuckDB Postcards

Valentine & Sons. -- See Hugh C. Leighton Co.

Warwick Bros. & Rutter, Ltd. (Toronto)