PICTURES FROM THE PAST
Postcards were the first real social-media phenomenon of the 20th century, and can take you on a wonderful voyage of discovery. My love affair began when my parents bought a card sent to a British soldier in the First World War by a brother in the USA, and it proved so interesting a research project that I’ve now spent years investigating hundreds of postcards sent during the early 1900s and writing about them. They frequently take me on an amazing journey.
Beginning with the recipient’s details I look in the obvious place first – the census returns. At this early stage you soon appreciate the benefits of today’s postcode system. Even cards sent to an address in a city might only have the name of a region, and then you discover how common a recipient’s unusual-seeming name actually is. Cards sent to smaller towns and villages might have even less helpful information. In these cases it’s often a matter
