Do you collect old postcards of LHs. Let us know about your collection.? Tell us how you started. Where do you get them? And tell us about your collection.

I do not collect old/antique postcards. I do have some cards from the 20's and the 30's that were given to me by my mother-in-law but they do not depict lighthouses. My postcard collecting is limited to getting as many new and different lighthouse postcards as I can.

Bob

I started collecting old lighthouse postcards about 8 years ago. When I went to lighthouses back then, I didn't buy new ones.
That's what I had a camera for! Now I buy old and new. I have many from the 20's and 30's and a few as far back as 1902. Some of the lighthouses on the cards are no longer standing. What I like the best is comparing the pictures from back then to the way they look today.
My father-in-law first told me about postcard shows 8 years ago. I had never knew there was such a thing at that time. I couldn't believe what I saw when I went to my first show! There must have been 30 to 40 people selling thousands of postcards of just about any subject you could imagine! We had 2 shows a year in the Cincinnati area back then. Now I have to travel north to Dayton for a show. The man that ran the show in Cincinnati told me a few of the sellers have died in the past few years and attendance is down for him to make a profit renting a banquet room at a motel.
Plus the price of cards has gone up in the past few years. In the past, I could find many nice old cards for a dollar or less. Now, the cards sell for 3 or 4 dollars or more. That can get expensive real fast! Hopefully in the near future I can post some of my favorites from the past!

I don't formally collect them but I pick them up whenever I can. I have about 50 I guess, mostly Florida lights and others in the South.

I have a small collection of about 20 antique cards or so. I like the old "colorized" cards and I buy ones that show the lighthouse or station different than it is today - buildings that are gone now, etc.

I always look at antique stores and malls, but they're getting harder to find lately. There are quite a few on e-bay if you search for "lighthouse postcards" but I haven't bought any that way yet.

Larry

Larry,
You brought up a good point about antique stores. They can be a good source for LH postcards. I also have to agree that the older ones are getting harder to find. I have gone to antique shows in the past, but after paying $5.00 or more to get in sometimes, it kind of defeats the purpose if no cards can be found. Also, antique shops seem to charge a premium anyway!

Here is one of my favorite old postcards. It is Old Point Comfort from around the early 1900's. (No date on the back of the card). Compare it to a current picture and you will notice some changes! http://www.thenethoster.com/uploads/indianajones/lite2.jpg

I have a few "oldies" but don't really collect them. I do, however, have quite a few old postcards of other subjects which my Dad had collected. His collection included postcard sized school report cards of his and his siblings. He was born in 1910 and was the 2nd youngest of 5 children so they're pretty darn old!

I do enjoy looking at the old lighthouse postcards on Ebay, especially those of lights that no longer exist or have changed significantly. I have occasionally printed out some of those that are pictured in a decent size and added them to some of my lighthouse reference books.

I've taken much the same route as Mombo. I have no old postcards, but I do have alot of scans and printouts. With the prices on the older cards being what they are I decided that the image on the card was what I was really after so I started saving printouts of the cards on ebay. For anyone who has some antique cards and a scanner I would love to get some scans of your cards. I'm particularly interested in versions of lighthouses that differ from the way they look today or lighthouses that simply don't exist anymore. And yes, I have purchased the Lost Lighthouses book that came out last year which, incidentally, I would recommend to anyone who is interested in lighthouse history.

GT

I have been collecting old lighthouse postcards for about 12 years. I have managed to accumulate somewhere around 1800 (all different cards) at last count. These are all non-chrome and about half of them pre-1930. Of these I have about 400 New York State cards and about 170 cards which include lightships, life saving, lighthouse related, and trade cards. The other 1200 or so are mostly United States, except for about 150 or so Canadian and World-Wide cards. When I first started I bought cards for . 50 and 1.00. Now especially with the advent of EBay, the prices have risen considerably. A good card at a postcard show will usually run between 5 an 10 dollars, some a little bit higher. On EBay a good card can cost you $30, $40, $50 and even higher in some cases. I noticed at the last few postcard shows a scarcity of older lighthouse cards. I am glad that I started my collection when I did. I couldn't afford to do it now.


"TheLightkeeper"

This is getting to be a good informational topic. I started collecting Long Island LH Postcards about a year ago and sad to say most of my purchases are on ebay. I once saw a postcard of Cold Spring Harbor go for $154.00 and the next week I got the same one for about $10.00. I've never seen another one offered. Sometimes it's your only source for lost lhs. It's interesting to see changes in the old picture of paint, remodeling, additions, landscape, erosion, etc. We plan on using the pcs as models when we do restorations at Plum Island and Cedar Point.