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As We Were: American Photographic Postcards, 1905-1930
by Rosamond B. Vaule (Foreword: Richard Benson)
Product Group: Book
Publisher: David R Godine (2004-10-31)
ISBN: 1567922503
EAN: 9781567922509
Dewy Decimal #: 779.997391
Hardcover: 215 pages
Condition: New
Comments: 2004, First Edition, 215 pages, 7 x 10, Hardcover with dustjacket. Book & Dustjacket are in Unused Condition. Book is completely intact with inside pages in Excellent Condition with no tears and with no notations (no pencil marks, no underlining, no highlighting, etc.) Fast Service. Books well packed.
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Editorial Reviews
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Product Description
Today, no one seriously doubts the value, both aesthetic and historic, of the ubiquitous American photographic postcard. This was the medium that really brought photography to the masses; these cards were affordable, they were topical, and they could be sent for a penny anywhere in the country. The variety of imagery, much of it developed anonymously in small studios, much of it taken by inspired amateurs (these were the days when anyone could, and many folks did, own a camera) displays America in all its variety and vitality.
Most postcards were mass produced and printed in ink by the collotype or halftone process. But a few were original photographic prints, exposed directly from glass plates or film negatives. Known as "real photos" these were real photographs, aristocrats of the genre and spectacular examples of vernacular photography.
In this charming and scholarly book, Vaule selects the best of them, from all over the country, addressing their social and historical contexts, explaining the mysteries of their manufacture and dissemination, and describing the characteristics and identities of their makers, many of whose names and studios are listed in the book. But without doubt, it is the images themselves that still hold us: storefronts and townships, frisky children and sober adults, air ships and barn raisings. Over one hundred are reproduced here, each in fine-line duotone, each as fascinating and compelling today as when first fixed on paper.
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Customer Reviews
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Engaging book
Rating  (5)
Date: 2007-04-28
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
As We Were is an engaging book. I wish there had been more photos. However, the ones that were used were interesting and informative and added to the contents of the book. It is a very nostalgic look at a long ago time when life was in many ways less frentic and harried. It is well written and I would recommend it. Hopefully Ms. Vaule will write another book.
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Was hoping for more photos
Rating  (2)
Date: 2007-01-28
3 out of 4 customers found this reveiw helpful
This book was priced quite high ($), considering the number of vintage photos inside. It is a hard back book, however, I truly was expecting many more photos,considering the large size (page wise) of this hard back book. I think there are other books out there with better (& more) vintage photos. I would not buy this book again, if I had the chance.
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AS WE WERE
Rating (5)
Date: 2005-09-19
11 out of 13 customers found this reveiw helpful
My brother, Bob, read this book before I did. He's a Harvard graduate with a PhD and an extensive vocabulary, but he's a populist at heart and in practice. He was animated and enthusiastic about the book. Nodding and gesturing he said: "She gets it."
AS WE WERE covers its subject, American Photographic Postcards, thoroughly and with insight, but the book does more than that. It transcends the genre and becomes a book about life "We're face to face with both their moment of reality in the card and their absolute transience.". The author's scholarly approach is laced with wisdom and humanity. Who would think that a book about real photo postcards (to use the vernacular) would be so compelling?
Ms. Vaule's introduction to photographic postcards was as a child. Her grandfather had them in albums. "For my grandparents the card represented a souvenir of a place or a special occasion, a status proudly attained or an expression of delight in their son's young life. For me, the card becomes a way of getting closer to them as they were before I entered into the continuum."
Real photo postcards were made by professional photographers and amateurs alike. Real photo postcards were "unpretentious, on home ground, cheap, and ready for mailing..." Surprisingly, the vast majority were not mailed but were used as souvenirs or gifts.
Real photo postcards showed people in their everyday clothes standing in front of the clapboards of their homes. The author elaborates on one such photograph: "This is such a stable picture, all verticals and horizontals except for the collar and windswept skirt. Rebecca, her left foot solidly at center, is a pillar of cheerful strength." There's a family in their Sunday best, out on a rural road, standing for their portrait. One young man curiously sits apart on a pile of stones. There is a delightful photograph of a boy on the ground with his hand on a resting pig. The sender's message: "Dear Aunt.....Joe wants to know if you know which one is he......"
Ms. Vaule comments on a photo of a working man holding his baby: "........incongruity of strapping man and tiny child so tenderly held, and of their physicality against the painted romantic landscape.....We are struck with the man's concentration on the task: hold the child carefully, face the lens so that a fitting image can be made."
Real photo postcards showed how people worked, and what they wore when they worked. There is an outdoor portrait of a group of postal workers, who hold their packages of mail like trophies. Their humble presentation becomes our treasure. In another scene, there's humor in the two loggers who turn the saw blades on themselves. On another page, the huge barn with the symmetrical slope in front of it defines the four farmhands who stand in its doorway. The Ohio bootmaker looks like an actor on center stage.
The selection of photographs is especially rich. We see a group of children arm in arm, running in a joyous dance on the beach in Santa Barbara. We know it wasn't as spontaneous as it appears, but who could've choreographed the two children to the right who are side by side with legs raised, or the bunching that occurred to the line at the left?
Not all is blissful in this America. There is the photo of the general store with a message about the sick father on reverse. There's the interior of Mary Fletcher Hospital where patients and nurses alike pose for the camera. The three men from Hornbreak Tennessee seem to gawk at us, just as we gawk at them. We see George Schmitt's Red Devil plane in flight, taken in rural Vermont. The plane transforms this card from mundane to captivating, and then we read the message: "This is Schmitt flying the day he was killed."
in looking through the imagery in this book, we have to abandon the concept that all is naive, for much of the work is informed, even if it's informed by an earlier time. There are the Montpelier boys in front of the ruins of a still smoldering fire. Their dark clothes provide great contrast to the snow around them. A pedestrian is a blur and the dog is a 'ghost' image. This depiction of action is now perceived as a modern value, yet it's as old as photography itself.
We bring ourselves into these photographs. What's more surreal than the Cincinnati flood scene showing an urban landscape populated only by people in boats with oars?.This particular scene has added significance since Hurricane Katrina, and yet it still seems imagined.
One senses the hope and changing values of the time. A small town shows off its shiny fire engine. The store advertsiing "New & Second-Hand Furniture" reminds us that the recycling industry is not completely new. A young woman dives off a dock to this response; "I guess by the picture that the College girls have fully as good a time as we do." We see people posed with machines and a couple of factory postcards could be right out of Charlie Chaplin's Modern Times.
Ms. Vaule's sense of inclusion truly reflects the American experience. While celebrating diversity with pictures, the author points out the racist language on the reverse of an image of people in an alfalfa field as well as the disturbing sign above the Hopi and Navajo dancers. We marvel at the beauty of 'Alaska woman' and are intrigued by the woman holding the puppy and an empty chair.
Don't let the title AS WE WERE deceive you. It is accurate, but this is not a nostalgic book. It offers insight to who we are and how the past precedes the future.
My brother is right. Rosamond Vaule does 'get it.' And while she 'gets it' her greater gift is in the telling.
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Exploring Another Facet of American Identity
Rating (5)
Date: 2005-06-24
4 out of 6 customers found this reveiw helpful
What a great book! Ms. Vaule's informed research and graceful writing make "As We Were" a wonderful weekend or vacation read. Her historical perspective ties together fascinating photographs to help illuminate our national identity as America entered the 20th Century. This is a book to enjoy, to share and to give.
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A Compelling Look at Our American Past
Rating (5)
Date: 2005-03-06
11 out of 12 customers found this reveiw helpful
Rosamond Vaule's new book, As We Were, is a wonderfully readable study of the early twentieth century "real photo" postcard. What began as a childhood passion for her grandfather's basket of photographic postcards has evolved into a scholarly look at over 200 true-to-size postcards which reflect aspects of American life from 1900 - 1930: a Model S. Ford, a three-desk schoolroom in South Carolina, the bi-plane and airship, cowboys in N. Dakota, a barn raising in Wisconsin. The author provides a detailed and colorful history of this seemingly "humble" subject matter. One learns about the intriguing ghosts of "spirit photography," the "Kodak girls" and the craze for postcards by 1905 when 7 billion were sent worldwide. But the real soul and beauty of the book reside in the images on the "real photo" postcards themselves. One is struck by the grave expressions of early twentieth century Americans and the matter of fact messages they sent. "Arrived Saturday. Start work Monday." Many of the "real photo" images in the book are compelling works of art and each postcard begs investigation for informational clues about its subject. I found myself looking repeatedly at each postcard, intent on unearthing a new find; an untied shoelace, a face peeping through a window. In our era of digital image manipulation, As We Were celebrates the integrity and unintended surprises of the early photographic postcard. Handsomely presented, this book is a pleasure to read and a treasure to keep.
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