Local post card collectors club to host annual show May 31
By Jessica Talarick
Before smart phones buzzed with text messages and Instagram photos, friends and family often communicated from distance by postcard.
Standard mail may not be today’s preferred mode of communication, but members of the Washington Crossing Card Collectors Club are keeping postcards alive. This May 31, the club, also known as WC4, invites postcard enthusiasts and noncollectors to browse through thousands of cards at their fifth annual Postcard Show.
Four members of the Coryell’s Ferry Stamp Club founded WC4 in 1972. Founding member Betty Davis, of Wrightstown Township, Pa., said late Titusville resident Ted Bozart was the guiding light behind the club.
Bozart realized that several stamp club members were also interested in postcards; he encouraged them to start a club exclusively for cards. So Davis, Bozart and a few other stamp collectors branched off to create WC4.
The founding members put an advertisement for their first meeting in a local paper; Davis said 15 people attended. Titusville resident Carol Meszaros attended the first meeting, which took place in the stone barn at Washington Crossing State Park.
“We unanimously voted that a club was in order,” Meszaros said.
Meszaros said membership swelled as word about the new club spread through postcard collecting circles. Now, about 50 people attend WC4’s monthly meetings, which feature presentations on various postcard topics as well as the opportunity to buy cards from local vendors, trade with other members and participate in an auction.
Many of the club’s 200 plus members, including people who live as far as California, join to read Davis’ monthly newsletters. The letters, sent via U.S. mail, include two pages of announcements, and a four-page recap of the previous month’s meeting presentation.
Davis started her collection as a child. She was introduced to postcards through her mother, who was an avid stamp collector. While browsing stamp auctions, Davis’ mother would find albums full of postcards for only a few cents. She brought the books home for her daughter.
Davis said those books were assembled in the early 1990s, when postcards were common means of communication. Receivers would save cherished postcards from friends and family in albums. Some of these albums eventually made their way to auctions, known to collectors as bourses, where stamp aficionados would pick them up for their postage stamps.
For the past 70 years, Davis’ collection has grown from the books her mother bought her to thousands of cards. She collects all types of postcards, including ones that feature her last name.
“It’s amazing how frequently you see the name Davis,” she said. She estimates her collection contains more than 1,000 postcards that feature her last name in the form of towns, street names and buildings.
Meszaros says her collection has too many cards to count.
The 45-year Titusville resident and her husband Robert are local history buffs who collected photos from their hometown and the surrounding area. The couple frequently came across postcards depicting the towns they researched and started a new collection. Their collection is not limited to images of the Titusville area.
“We like about any postcard there is, frankly,” she said of her collection, which also includes images of Washington Crossing, Pa. and Bear Tavern.
Meszaros attended the first meeting without her husband, who was busy working at the Western Electric Facility on Carter Road. She was the second person to add her named to the club’s membership sign-up sheet. “I’m member number two,” she proudly states.
Since the inaugural meeting, Meszaros has been an influential member of WC4. She has served as president, trustee and treasurer and is currently the club’s secretary. Much like the Meszaros’, Robbinsville resident Larry Hoffman and his wife Linda discovered postcard collecting through a different hobby.
“We were antique collectors when we first got married,” Hoffman said, “collecting a little of this, a little of that.”
The couple started buying postcards because they were reasonably priced and began building a collection.
Hoffman joined WC4 in 1972 when he lived in Ewing, but stopped going to meetings after he moved to Robbinsville with Linda and their son Keith.
About six years after retiring, Hoffman attended the club’s annual show and rekindled his passion for postcards. He rejoined the club and was elected vice president. Hoffman is running for a second term in May.
While collectors like Meszaros have too many cards to count, Hoffman said his is “mighty, but it’s small.”
He specializes in real photo cards from Mercer County and the surrounding area. Hoffman says he spends years searching for rare — and often times expensive — cards.
He is currently trying to complete a mini-collection within his collection. He has 12 of 16 photo cards from a small town in Burlington County, and is searching for the final four.
Hoffman’s favorite postcard in his collection depicts a grocery store on South Broad Street in Trenton. As a boy he lived in Trenton, and passed the building regularly while he was walking to school without ever realizing it contained a grocery store. The grocery store no longer inhabits the space, but the building remains.
He recommends those interested in starting a postcard collection start out by attending a show and browsing.
“There’s something for everyone in postcards because it covers everything,” Hoffman said.
Davis and Meszaros agree. Both said the wide variety of illustrations on the front of postcards appeal to all types of interests.
“No matter what your hobby is, you’re bound to find a postcard that fits in,” Davis said.
WC4’s annual postcard show features three rooms of vendors who bring boxes of postcards to sell. Meszaros said postcard dealers are always eager to bring their inventory to WC4’s show.
“It’s the kind of show when dealers are asked to participate, they can’t wait to sign up,” she said.
In addition to about 20 postcard vendors, the postcard Show features displays. Collectors show off their prized postcards on pieces of poster boards around the venue.
The fourth annual postcard show is scheduled to take place May 31 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Union Fire Company, 1396 River Road, Titusville. Admission is $3.
WC4 meets the second Monday of every month at Union Fire Company. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. with vendors and the formal program is scheduled to begin 8 p.m.
More information is online at wc4postcards.org.
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