Over/Under Postcards

Over/Under Postcards have a nice explanatory feel to them; it is just *so* thoughtful of the designer/publisher to juxtapose what is happening above & below the surface so that we can fully grasp The Big Picture.

First up: the Pennsylvania RR tunnel passing under the Hudson River.

And, in another first, I wiki'd to nail-down the date of construction - so as to better date the NYP (Not Yet Posted) postcard - and found this same postcard!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_River_Tunnels

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

what's interesting to me is the non relation of the scales - essential perhaps - but someone who had no idea of these things might have thought the tunnels huge, and the boats tiny.

I had only thought that the river was unnaturally crowded, as if the illustration were painted during an Independence Day Regatta, but you're right: the two illustrations are remarkably, uh, 'independently scaled'.

When you were a little kid, didn't you combine such toys as needed to be combined, regardless of scale?

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

Here's an Over/Under Postcard of the "underground rail road" lines (hereinafter The Lexington Avenue IRT) and the Manhattan Municipal Building (MMB) near the Manhattan terminus of the Brooklyn Bridge.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manha...pal_Building

On the Google Maps image (below), the two smaller circles mark the tops of the MMB and the US Court House, both of which appear on the card.

The larger circle marks 1PP, as a courtesy to the Blue Bloods fans.

The subway lines run across the front of the MMB, and the entrance to that station is in that park.

[tangential_aside]

There is an unused trolley barn under Delancey Street, at the Manhattan terminus of the Williamsburg Bridge, that a civic-minded group is trying to re-develop as an 'event space'. Those trolleys ran across that bridge. I do not know whether/not the trolleys in our Over/Under Postcard are the trolleys that ran across the Brooklyn Bridge.

[/tangential_aside]

The '1920' is a serial number. The card has an UnDivided Back, as befits the 1906 postmarks.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

Here's another Over/Under card with a scale issue.

I can promise you that, during Rush Hour, those trains never feel that big.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joral...treet_Tunnel ... a/k/a The Joralemon Street Tunnel

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

Postcard from the collection of Michael Lebbert.

An Over/Under card from the New York Central Railway, advertising 'side trips' to Niagara Falls.

I'm gonna guess that means that they offered a bus ride from the train station in Buffalo, but there was a spur, but I think it was a narrower gauge, but see 'guess' (above).

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

Edited to append: Postcard from the collection of Michael Lebbert.

Here is an Over/Under that is also a Before/After.

Sure glad they explained which was which ... and why.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

I recently received a wonderfully mis-described lot ("Unused Postcards") that included ...

20x reprints of Cold War East Berlin photographs

12x other East Berlin & DDR

13x of the castle-palace Konigsschloss

~40 dressed Teddy Bears (of a 52-card set)

... all for U$D 21 postpaid.

Two of the Cold War photo reprints are Over/Under Before/After postcards, one replete with a psywar explanation.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

An indexed postcard for the Sky Room airport cafe in Lansing MI.

Q/ Anybody wanna play name'n'date that car? Three beauties to choose from!

The cars would give an earliest possible publication date.

But the fastest route to a latest possible publication date would probably be that 5-digit phone number.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

.
You can live in NYC, see the signs to "PATH", and still not really know what PATH might be.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PATH_(rail_system)

Here's an over-under postcard celebrating the opening of the second PATH tunnel, postmarked 22/August/1911, two years after that event.





The message seems to read "Was looking for College Ice but cannot find any."

That makes little sense to me.

It could be "college ice (hockey)", but the card is postmarked August .. are we being droll yet?

Worse, if you look at the letter "C" in "Clark", "Conn", and "O'Connor", you can begin to doubt that the key word is "College".

Q/ Any thoughts?

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

Hi ikey,
Sorry I didn't see your post from 2016



The middle car is a 1948 or 1949 Studebaker.

Don

Thanks, Don!

The rightmost car by the Sky Room looks to be a 1949 Mercury. Some 1950 models also have 1949 details like the bezel/trunk latch.

Thanks, hy-brasil!

According to the Urban Dictionary, "College Ice" is a slang term for Natural Ice beer, apparently a favorite among college students because of its low price. Obviously that wouldn't be relevant for a use of the term in 1911, but maybe it was slang for something else back then? A very interesting puzzle!

Enrico Fereoli - II Gigante di Luzzara (The giant of Luzzara)

http://bbcc.ibc.regione.emilia-roma...d_card=63470