The New York Public Library's Picture Collection at Mid-Manhattan Library adds 500 Historical Postcards of New York City to the NYPL Digital Gallery

A fascinating historical peek at all five boroughs of New York City from the 1890s until the 1920s is provided through the 500 postcards newly added to the NYPL Digital Gallery from the Picture Collection's holdings of more than 25,000 postcards.

The postcards offer a colorful visual record of the city and document the beginnings of the postcard publishing phenomenon in the United States. Both the front and back of each postcard can be viewed.  The postcards also illustrate emerging lithographic and photographic printing styles.  Among the examples digitized are oil paintings, tinted photographs, colored lithographs, line photoengravings, relief prints, inkless intaglio prints, linocuts, hold-to-light cards, and cards with highlights delineated by glitter.

An online exhibit highlighting the project and providing examples of the digitized images can be found at http://www.nypl.org/branch/central/mml/postcards/index.html

This project was supported in part by funds from the Metropolitan New York Library Council (METRO) through the New York State Regional Bibliographic Databases Program.

You may wish to begin your exploration of the Picture Collection's contribution of over 30,000 images to the NYPL Digital Gallery by visiting the Collection Guide to the Picture Collection.

--Susan


Susan Chute, Supervising Librarian
Art and Picture Collections
Mid-Manhattan Library
455 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10016-0122
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