Reading Glued-in Postcards

It's always a thrill to discover a new photograph, such as the one of this lovely large home, printed as a postcard.   But how frustrating to turn it over and find writing - but due to paper glued on the back, it's impossible to read it. 

 

I could not even make out the postmark, which was especially frustrating.   My husband had a fantastic idea, which ended up solving the mystery.  All we needed was a bright, LED flashlight - 

The  card was postmarked Melrose, Minn., Oct. 1914, and was addressed to Casper J. Kluthe of Howell, South Dakota, and was from Henry Eikmeier, his brother-in-law.  It reads, "Melrose Oct 30 1914    Will be at Orient next Wednesday Nov 4th   Hope you will meet us

Yours

Henry Eikmeier"

Being able to put a date to this card also helped to date photographs from visits of the Eikmeier family to the Kluthe family; prior to being able to read this postcard, I was only able to guesstimate the dates within a few years.  In addition, I can add another date/place to the Eikmeier timeline.

I have a number of old photos and postcards that have been glued into albums, and the unfortunate part is that most of those albums had black paper rather than white, so this tip won't work for every situation.  But in this case, it saved the day.

More Fun -and Haunted - Finds in the Office

This is the second-oldest item I've discovered in the bowels of my office - the oldest being a commencement program from 1884 - but this item is interesting as well.  It's a 1919 calendar from Turlock Mercantile Co. in Turlock, California.  Besides its age, I thought the overall design of the calendar was interesting.  Although a little ripped up and some water damage, the calendar portion looks like it was never used.

The Turlock Mercantile Building as it looked in 2014, photo courtesy of Google Earth.

Many businesses have inhabited the building over the years, from the dry good business that started it all, to retails stores, offices, even a boarding house above.  It started out as a wood building, and was bricked later.

An article in the Turlock Journal notes that paranormal investigations were done at Turlock Mercantile building in 2008.  Numerous reports were made over the years of strange noises and ghost sightings, so some amateur investigators decided to look into it, and got strange results themselves - the article says it better than I could:  "[They] got more than they bargained for when rattling noises began and the front door alarm went off right in front them. Even more spooky were the sounds of footsteps and a six-digit phone number being dialed the recorder picked up and the unexplained ending of the tape, even though the reels were still turning."

At that point, they brought in the professionals who did their own investigation and concluded that the ghost of the building's founder, Horace Crane, was among many that still called the building "home."   If you want an interesting read, consult the original story at http://www.turlockjournal.com/archives/6309/.