This is a very interesting card for several reasons. It is unique. I've never seen another card like it. It was manufactured by the Art Mfg. Co., Amelia, Ohio, but its back design is different from the other Art Mfg. Co. cards in the collection. Its embossed shamrock design, tinted views, and gold print give it production values that exceed any other card in the collection. And then there's the four views themselves. Only one of them is known to me in postcard form -- the view of the northeast corner of the square: A real-photo version of this view was sold on eBay in 2002. (It also appears as one of several half-tone illustrations in the History of Washington County Indiana, 1916 - 1976 that provide a photographic tour of the Salem public square. (The real-photo postcard appeared to be dated 1886 in pencil on its face, but very little has changed between this view and the Neal's Soda Fountain series view from the 1920s.) Postcard manufacturers historically seem to follow a sort of Law of the Conservation of Illustration Material: they get the most use -- and revenue -- out of the photographs they pay to use on cards. Views that appear on multi-view cards like this one almost always also appear on individual cards. That means that these views of Salem are still waiting to be collected as separate cards: This view of the courthouse is most like the Weixelbaum Series view. Both were photographed on winter days with few people in the view. But notice that this was photographed at about 10:05 (or 1:55). In the Weixelbaum photograph the clock reads about 8:25, and the shadows of the courthouse chimneys confirm the early morning hour. This view is an odd amalgam of the two views of the high school in the "Red Back" series. It has the roofline of the "Lyon High School" view (notice the highlights on the rooftop ventilators) but the window treatments of the "Joint High School" photograph (the blinds are pulled in many of the classroom windows). My guess is that it's a picture taken at the same time as the "Joint High School" photograph, from a few paces to the left. The inclusion of this view of the new concrete bridge on North Main Street underscores the message of the Brock Creek Bridge card in the "Red Back" series -- that the poured-concrete bridge was something of an engineering marvel in its day. This view appears to have been taken from the opposite (east?) side of the bridge from the "Red Back" photograph. And the joining of an Art Mfg. Co. mark to photographs used in the "Red Back" series makes me wonder whether the Amelia, Ohio, company may be the maker of that series as well. This card was postmarked from Salem at 5 p.m. on Nov. 7, 1909, and addressed to Miss Leonar Leichleiter, 919 Culbt Ave., New Albany, Ind. The message reads, "My Dear Leonar:- It was awfully kind and sweet of you to write me about your Aunt Laura. I just rec'd a letter from her this a.m. Glad she is getting better. Tell her I'll write soon. With lots of love to you all I am Sincerely Your Friend, Ella A-". (4/3/04) Home | The 1900s | Next card