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Found Art
On April 15, 1952, someone had 36 envelopes sealed, stamped and postmarked. In 1981, we bought their house and found a file cabinet in the basement, with the envelopes. As I was dabbling in mail art...
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What Is Faux Postage?
“It was recognized even in the eighteen-sixties that collectors had to contend with not only forgeries of government-issued postage stamps but also stamps whose validity existed only in the imagination...
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The AR-15
The AR-15 is made to kill people, many people in a short period of time. It is not made for hunting game, target shooting or home defense. There are guns specifically designed for those tasks. I grew...
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Three stories about abortion: My parents listened to the news on the radio during breakfast and read the morning paper. I remember hearing reports of women found dead in hotel rooms, and reading about...
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Accessible
Recently, as I researched mail art created in the 19th and early 20th century, I came across a woodblock print postcard. And I learned that in the early 1900s, paper companies – such as A.H. Abbott in...
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The Prisoner
“I took the expressway out to the track, driving very fast and jumping the monster car back and forth between lanes, driving with a beer in one hand and my mind so muddled that I almost crushed a...
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The Father of Mail Art
On July 14, 1840, Theodore Hook sent, and received, the first hand-drawn, hand-colored postcard. Mailed to Fulham, in southwest London, with a recently issued Penny Black stamp, the card features...
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The Butcher of Clinton Street
This past week, we noticed the presence of mice in our basement. In one way, I like mice. They’re cute, plump and furry. I understand why they want to join us. It’s cold outside and there’s not much...
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Brewing in New York
This article was written for Syracuse New Times, July 23, 1986, and rewritten for the Song Mountain Brewfest program in 1997. * * * The Empire State’s recorded brewing history begins with the Dutch...
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The Rebus in Mail Art
Historically, postal authorities have looked upon the rebus with mixed feelings. A “rebus” uses an image to communicate a name, word or phrase. The word “rebus” came from the Latin phrase “Non verbis...
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Porte Timbres
Given my love for all things postal, you’d think I’d have heard of “porte timbres” a long time ago. But no. Porte timbres (French for “stamp holders”) were frames with a space in the center for a...
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Gene LaVerne
You say “Buffalo” and I say “Millard Fillmore! Cookie Gilchrist! Goo Goo Dolls!” But recently I learned of another reason to shout: Gene LaVerne. A professional dancer, he turned to photography when a...
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Hans Liska
This painting haunts me. I find it beautiful and fascinating. And yet the subject matter – German Stuka dive bombers returning to Greece after a mission over Crete – is, to say the least, disturbing....
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Tuck’s Paintbox Series
In the first two decades of the 1900s, Raphael Tuck & Sons, England’s foremost postcard producer, published a series of Postcard Painting Books, an introduction to mail art for children. In...
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Taglines
In my 38 years as a copywriter, I found taglines the most difficult to write. Long copy was easy. Shorter copy, written to fit a layout, a little harder. Headlines, very difficult. But taglines – in...
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Hollis Slocum
It has been said that your interest in family history begins at the funeral of the last person who could have answered your questions. So it is with me and my interest in Hollis William Slocum. I...
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Abbie
For many years, I was very lucky to have two grandmothers. Grandma Braun, my mother’s mom, loved little children, until they could talk back. When my cousin Daryl and I told her that the wrestling...
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