Since there’s no worded suggestion, one must assume that it’s the illustration that is meant to impart some guidance. What I’m getting out of it is that you should take your lover to a quiet spot in the moonlight, stick out your tongue, and see what happens.

This card didn’t go through the postal system and appears to have been hand-delivered to Great-Grandpa Phil, presumably by some young lass who was making her intentions clear. Looks like Phil had a happy Valentine’s Day; I hope you do the same.

I hate to admit it, but the first thought that popped into my head upon seeing this image of a bear and a rabbit was the old joke about whether or not feces sticks to their fur, which is rated PG. But these two are clearly friends. The bear is either copping a feel, or he’s shielding her from all those flying apples. Either way, it’s clear that they’re close.

This card comes from Tun, a young Chinese girl who would like to remind you that “everyday is a sunshine day!”

Hi! This little guy might be skating on the Great Lakes, where right now there are blizzard conditions and forecasts for more snow. Good luck, folks, and stay warm.

This bobcat postcard, published in 1939 by the National Wildlife Publishing Corporation of New York, is “Subject 1″ in their “Wildlife Post Card Series”. Unfortunately, I’ve never seen Subjects 2 and up. Note the one-cent stampbox, and the blanks for name, address and city — no state required, apparently, and certainly no ZIP code back then.

The bobcat is pleased to be a part of Evelyn’s 5th “Festival of Postcards”, this one featuring quadrupeds, at her A Canadian Family postcard and genealogy blog — mostly on the off-chance that it’ll run into something tasty.

“While training, elephants enjoy their leisure time on a small river.” That description sort of implies that it is the elephants who are in charge and not the men. In fact, it looks as though the human leader is getting a reminder of that.

This postcard was sent to me by the lovely Linkenel, who herself lives in Chiang Mai Province, Thailand.

This handy-dandy little piece of advertising ephemera dates from the 1930s — it’s actually an ink blotter, to mop up the excess ink from those pesky fountain pens.  The card that you see is mounted to a piece of purple paper that feels both rough and absorbent — lots of microscopic divots to really soak up the ink.

Wampole’s Creo-Terpin was produced from about the turn of the (20th) century until at least the 1940s; there are other World War II-era cards featuring guides to military decorations rather than common birds.  As far as the bird cards, this is just one of a series.  The cards allowed the local distributor to stamp their own information on them as well.

The “Creo” in Creo-Terpin seems to come from wood creosote, a bush that we know today has even more medicinal value than Wampole thought; it’s good for upset stomach, arthritis, anemia, and is even an anti-microbial.  (One entry in the Canadian Journal of Medicine and Surgery from 1908 tells physicians how to increase the creosote dosage.)  The “Terpin”, on the other hand, probably refers to terpin hydrate, which was usually sold in a solution with codeine to relieve bronchitis.  Terpin hydrate was easy to make, a synthetic subsititute for oil of turpentine, which is an ingrediant in Vicks Vapo-Rub, and makes you feel better.  Unfortunately, the synthetic has never been proven effective (it was probably the codeine that made you feel better), and the FDA banned it about 15 years ago in the US.

When I was growing up, my grandmother had one of these cards on her desk.  I sure wish I had that one, but it’s doubtless been lost to the ages.  But one good thing in which to lose yourself is all the other blogs celebrating this week’s Postcard Friendship Friday.

Porpoises and dolphins are technically two different species, though they have a common land-based ancestor.  Seafaring fishermen tend to use the word “porpoise” to describe porpoises as well as any small dolphin.  This is a “Color King Natural Color” card, published by the W. M. Cline Company of Chattanooga.

Have you seen the “Dolphin Bubbles” phenomenon?  I first saw it online a couple of months ago and can’t get enough of it:

Nobody seems to be sure exactly how they learned to do it but, apparently, they’ve been teaching each other how to do it for quite some time. I also understand that it’s primarily the females who engage in this behavior, because the males are apparently too busy telling each other fish stories, bragging to each other about the one that got away. (OK, no, not really, but the males seem more concerned with social interaction than with self-amusement.)

My family and I have swam with the dolphins on a couple of occasions and, while one is immediately impressed with how intelligent they are, I am under the impression that nobody has seen this behavior in the wild before. I guess great minds require cool toys.

You can see some very cool still photos of the dolphins at play (and hopefully more videos to be posted soon) over at the Dolphin Bubbles website. I can’t wait to show the grandbabies!

Stacy sent me this card from the Friends of the Red Knot who, according to their website, is “a club whose members are trying to save the Red Knot bird from extinction by getting it placed on the Endangered Species List and by advocating for a ban on the harvesting of Delaware Bay horseshoe crabs. The club was formed when a few students at the GreenMount School in Baltimore, MD decided to get together and look for ways to help the Red Knot bird.”

It seems like a mixed blessing to me that, in the process of learning about the red knot, they’re also having to learn a lot about red tape.  Check out their site and give them some love.

“Also often called the Antelabbit, this, the most amazing of all desert animals is reputed to be a cross between a Jack Rabbit and an Antelope. Rumor has it that the Jackalope sings at night in a voice that sounds almost human.” This Continental-sized Plastichrome card was distributed by Petley Studios of Phoenix, Arizona, and probably dates back to the mid-1970s.

Update 23 September 2010: I’m sending this card off to Sandrine for her daughter, who is an admirer of rabbits; perhaps she will believe that this rabbit is typical of those in the U.S.

This unvarnished card from the Cape Shore Paper Company shows (from the top down) a bluebird, female and male summer tanagers, and a meadowlark. The age is undetermined and, while it’s not that new, it’s not that old either.

One day, about three years ago, my boss and I were walking back from lunch when he noticed this card lying on the front steps of our building. There was nobody else around, so we had no way of knowing who might have dropped it, or why they were carrying it in the first place. Very odd.

Here’s a cute card to Great-Grandpa Phil from someone called Bill, presumably a friend. Postmarked not too far from Phil in Vanderbilt, PA, August 3, 1912.

There are more than a few real photo postcards out there depicting Patrick J. “Paddy” Carroll, his wife Beatrice, and their sled dog team on their transcontinental trip, but this one has no postcard markings on the back — making it technically just a photo. My notes say that I paid ten cents for it in 1998.

It’s difficult to find concrete information on the Carrolls. Supposedly, it was Beatrice who raised and trained the dogs, and that their trip was financed, at least in part, through the sale of postcards like these. Also, Paddy is said to have written a small booklet of poems entitled Ditties of a Dog Musher, again using the proceeds towards the trip. It also appears that their trip was successful, and that they returned the same way the following year.

After the trip, the Carrolls are said to have settled in Granisle, British Columbia, where Paddy Carroll became a prospector and did quite well in the copper mine trade.

This real photo postcard is printed on AZO paper and, judging from the stampbox, was produced sometime between 1904 and 1918. It was purchased in the same lot as this real photo postcard of a barn and I would not be surprised if it came from the same family.

You have to hand it to the copywriter at the Asheville Post Card Company who came up with this pun on “two deer.” The caption aside, it’s a beautiful piece of work, and the card is both postally unused and looks as if it were manufactured yesterday. A close look shows that the yellow and cyan plates weren’t quite on center when they went through the printer; it’s most noticeable around the borders, the undersides of the deer, and on some of the tree limbs.

I’m posting this card today at the request of the misguidedkid, who felt that it was important to note that today is the start of firearms deer season in most of Georgia.

No, the scan isn’t out of focus; the postcard is. If I were manufacturing postcards, I would endeavour to make sure that my photos were a little more crisp.

The postcard reminds us that Okefenokee Swamp Park in Waycross, Georgia has “many forms of wildlife (including) huge alligators in natural haunts.” When I saw the card I was sure that this was Albert from Walt Kelly’s Pogo comics.

This is a “Plastichrome” (number P8768) by Colourpicture Publishers, Inc., Boston 15, Mass. It looks like it could have been printed yesterday.

Technically, this dolphin is probably having a blast just off Myrtle Beach. Purchased while away on a training boondoggle for work; I was actually closer to Raleigh than to Myrtle Beach. Published by APS.

From Great-Grandpa’s collection. “Bud” writes from Augusta, Michigan that he’s “having a swell time.” The penny stamp is postmarked June 29, 1949 at 1 P.M. The image is marked as ©1948 L.L. Cook Co., with a production number of L.C.-1. I wonder if there was an L.C.-2.

Great-Grandpa probably enjoyed receiving this. My cousin, John Hodinka (actually, my first cousin twice removed, to whom Great-Grandpa was “Uncle Phil”) says that Phil was pretty ornery. I mostly remember Phil as an old man who carried around his pocket change in a coin purse, and took me to Woolworth’s to buy Matchbox cars.