Grand Ave., Beloit, Wis.

Undated. From Cy. to Mrs. Frank Craft, Winona.

The picture

A downtown street seen down its length: a long ornate stone commercial block with awnings at left, a single streetcar coming toward the viewer at center under overhead wires, a red-brick block with a rooftop sign at the far end, and at right a building with a projecting bank sign and clock, a 'GOLDEN EAGLE' sign, and pedestrians on the sidewalk beside a red pedestal (drinking fountain or post).

• Printed caption: Grand Ave., Beloit, Wis.
• Printing: colored halftone · color
• Lettering in the picture: [illegible] JEWELER; HENRY & HOLAHAN; GOLDEN / EAGLE[?]; THE [illegible] BANK (projecting sign with clock)
• Postmark ink on the picture: offset of machine-cancel wavy bars in the sky at upper left, over the cornice of the left building, and fainter bars across the sky at center (from another card)
• Condition: light edge wear; a thin pale strip along the right edge of the scan

The back

• Layout: divided back (message at left, address at right)
• Printed: Post Card · ADDRESS · Plate 283. · E. C. Kropp Co., Pub., Milwaukee
• Stamp: 1c, green, profile bust in an oval, facing left (no name on the stamp)
• Postmark: BELOIT / AUG 5 / 10 30 AM / 1 […]5 / W[…]S. (machine cancel with wavy-line killer)
• Condition: toning and light soiling; a dark ink spot on the right edge of the datestamp

Exact copy

Line for line as written. [?] follows an uncertain word; [illegible] marks one that cannot be read; ~~ ~~ is crossed out, ^ ^ written above the line, […] runs off the card.

Message (back of the card, message half, written sideways, reading top to bottom (turn the card 90 degrees counterclockwise to read)):

Dear Aunt:-
I guess Cora can't
come to see you after all.
at least not for a while. I
think the ride would be almost
too much for her. I hope you
are all well. Ask Burns why
he does'nt write. Regards to all
Cy.

Address:

Mrs. Frank Craft.
206 Harvester Ave.
Winona,
Minn.

A later hand (pencil note in a different, later-looking hand, left of the address, below the dividing line's midpoint): Note / the / trolley

A later hand (a large pencil # with a small x, likely a collector's or dealer's mark, below 'Note the trolley'): # x

A later hand (faint pencil letters, perhaps a dealer's or collector's state classification, top edge above 'Dear Aunt'): WISC

Reading version

The message joined into sentences, the spelling lightly modernized only where it helps; uncertain words keep their marks.

Dear Aunt:- I guess Cora can't come to see you after all, at least not for a while. I think the ride would be almost too much for her. I hope you are all well. Ask Burns why he does'nt write. Regards to all. Cy.

Who

• Mrs. Frank Craft — recipient, addressed as 'Aunt', 206 Harvester Ave., Winona, Minn.
• Cy. — sender
• Cora — named in the message; can't make the trip, the ride too much for her
• Burns — named in the message; hasn't written

When

How	Date	Basis
filename	1915-08-05	the date in the scan's file name
card-features	after 1907-03-01	divided back: allowed in the US from 1 Mar. 1907

The readings

Part	Status	Readers
caption	all agree	claude, gemini, gpt
postmark	single reader	claude, gemini, gpt
address	majority	claude, gemini, gpt
message	majority	claude, gemini, gpt
signature	in message	claude, gemini

Uncertain readings:

• postmark, year: 1 […]5 (or 1915, 1925) — the middle digits of the year did not print
• address, line 1: Craft (or Kraft) — the capital is a looped C/K form
• message, line 7: Burns (or Burus) — the minims of the middle letters
• front, sign at right: GOLDEN / EAGLE — the second word is blurred in the printing
• later hands: WISC — very faint; may be an offset rather than writing on this card

Reader's note: Postmark year only partly printed; the visible digits do not settle it. The 'Note the trolley' pencil note is a later collector's remark, not the sender's.

Scans: 1915-08-05 - Grand Ave., Beloit, Wis. - 01.png and 1915-08-05 - Grand Ave., Beloit, Wis. - 02.png (sha256 b8bbaa360a47…, ba331c32c452…). Media: front — the scanner's white edge trimmed: kept pixels [0, 0, 1088, 696]; back — the scanner's white edge trimmed: kept pixels [0, 0, 1087, 695]