Tweet Silent Era Postcards

[silentfilm]

Vanity Fair (1911) still exists, Blackhawk used to sell it on film. I don't think it has been released on any video format.

Those three postcards are the oldest photos that I have. Vintage studio photos are hard to come by from before 1915. I only have two vintage stills from 1913.

Even though these images of Raymond Grifith may have postcard formatting on the back, they are actually arcade cards that were purchased from vending machines.

I have a postcard of Henry Walthall when he was with Biograph. I'll see if I can scan it tonight.

Here are a few more cards. The Paramount cards have blank backs with movie theatre and dates stamped. (In the same group I got another card for North of 36 that was like the one I posted previously but had a stamp as above rather than being used as a postcard.)


(on the set of East Is West)

Those color/poster postcards, Derek, are very cool. I've not seen these before.

It sure makes Tongues of Flame look promising. And what is happening to Pola in that picture--are vegetables being ejected from that guy's hand?

greta

[silentfilm]

Although the card says Louisiana, this lost film was actually released as The Love Mart (1927). That's Gilbert Roland and Raymond Turner.



This is definitely an arcade card since there is no printing on the back.

Here's a British postcard I acquired recently (thank you, eBay!) of Frank Borzage from his acting days:

Here's a British postcard I acquired recently (thank you, eBay!) of Frank Borzage from his acting days:

Looks more like Borzage from "The Man Who Laughs"! ;-}

Looks more like Borzage from "The Man Who Laughs"! ;-}

ROFL

I am wondering if I could get that brand and shade of lipstick somewhere...

[silentfilm]

Here's a really neat novelty postcard. If you wiggle the tab on the side, Ford Sterling's expression changes.


Here's how it works. There are three different images of Sterling, and each one consists of vertical bars. Each image repeats every third bar (except for his shoulders, which are the same in each picture.) As you move the front clear window with the bars, a different expression is exposed.

This postcard was never mailed, but it does have a message on the back. I'm guessing that it was sent in an envelope. The message indicates that the recipient, Mary Phillips, has been sick. Sterling only worked at Universal a few months in 1914, so the postcard probably dates from that year.

A question :

Why it's so rare to find good stills of Chaplin Keystone shorts ?????

Even BFI site used a lot of frames from bad prints, as stills, cause they had just a few stills of some shorts.

In the Mrs. Stich post card text:

"Mr. Ryan - please forward any mail for us to above address -- We are living out-here now -- We love summer weather, but -- I like a City beat. Go see the boy in pictures at City Square Theatrs (sic) the Keystone picture show there. Twice week. Kind Regards to all."

I think "City beat" should probably read "City best"

[silentfilm]

Thanks, Bob. I'll fix it on my website.

Here's an early advertising postcard...



The "Mutt and Jeff" film would have been a live action comedy short from the Nestor Film company, and not one of the long-running animated series that started a few years later. This would have almost certainly been a traveling exhibitor, as the Brewster Town Hall (which still stands today) was used for all kinds of events. Interestingly, this is a British postcard, but obviously it was not mailed, but just handed out as advertising.


Here's a postcard from Varsity (1928).

Here's another movie postcard used in 1911 that a friend recently obtained and let me scan:



Here is the AFI listing for the film though it doesn't have many details.

I have at least 200 silent movie era postcards which I bought during the early years of ebay when they could been had quite reasonably back then, often for $2-3 each, nowadays most people start the prices at around $10. The ones from Europe are the best, "real photo" glossy postcards with portraits of the stars like the ones Derek has of Laura La Plante and Betty Bronson on his scan. It seems movie star postcards were far more popular and in surplus in Europe than in the States and continued on into the 1940's at least though in the sound era the star postcards tended to be mainly the "gorgeous" stars like Dorothy Lamour, Robert Taylor,Tyrone Power, Hedy Lamarr, etc. than a wider variety of stars like in the silent era. Most of my silent postcards are of Pickford, Corinne Griffith, Anita Page, Dove, Shearer, Del Rio, Swanson, Murray, Gaynor, Pearl White, La Plante, Lillian Gish, Valentino, Novarro, and Farrell.

[silentfilm]

Minnie Maddern Fiske in Tess of the D'Urbervilles (1913).


Edna Purviance and Charlie Chaplin in A Woman (1915).


Charlie Chaplin, Snub Pollard and Billy Armstrong in By the Sea (1915)

CONTENT REMOVED COPYRIGHT CONCERN

Mr. Berry in a part, and costume, made famous - and filmed twice - by another

That's Prof. Eustace MacGargle in Poppy, played by W. C. Fields on the stage in 1923-24 (IIRC) and on film in SALLY OF THE SAWDUST (1925) and POPPY (1936). There is a publicity still of Fields from POPPY which bears a remarkable similarity to this picture.

[silentfilm]

Colleen Moore & Kenneth Harlan in "TWINKLETOES" (1926)


Edith Storey


Helen Holmes in THE GIRL AND THE GAME (1915)