Postcards: The Rise and Fall of the World’s First Social Network

by Lydia Pyne

A global exploration of postcards as artifacts at the intersection of history, science, technology, art, and culture.
 
Postcards are usually associated with banal holiday pleasantries, but they are made possible by sophisticated industries and institutions, from printers to postal services. When they were invented, postcards established what is now taken for granted in modern the ability to send and receive messages around the world easily and inexpensively. Fundamentally they are about creating personal connections—links between people, places, and beliefs. Lydia Pyne examines postcards on a global scale, to understand them as artifacts that are at the intersection of history, science, technology, art, and culture. In doing so, she shows how postcards were the first global social network and also, here in the twenty-first century, how postcards are not yet extinct.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

256 pages, Hardcover

Published December 21, 2021

Reviews

[Rhiannon Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I included this release in my book feature for the January 2022 issues of Naples, Johns Creek, Buckhaven, and Alpharetta Lifestyles magazines

In 1909 the United States Post Office was $17 million in debt ($483 million today,) primarily due to the immense and exponential drain on our nation's postal resources as Free Rural Delivery routes expanded. Amazingly, just two years later, the Post Office announced a profit of over $200,000 ($5.7 million today.) How? Postcards! The hundreds of millions of postcards Americans were sending during the Golden Age of Postcards (1905-1920) became a lifeline for the Post Office at a time when it desperately needed Americans to mail more items. In addition to learning how this small piece of mail saved the United States Post Office, Lydia Pyne's Postcards: The Rise and Fall of the World's First Social Network takes readers on a global journey through revolutions, social movements, scientific and technological discoveries, and sentimental personal connections. In addition to providing an all-encompassing look at the cultural and historical significance of postcards themselves, this book also examines the details of postcards as the first worldwide social network. The analog precedent to today's image-based photo-sharing platforms, the social network of postcards over a century ago, is equivalent to the short messages we currently consume each day on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, and TikTok. Postcards is both a marvelous, in-depth analysis of physical postcards and their circulation systems and a thought-generating look into how a version of almost everything you see on your current digital social media networks was first produced, composed, and mailed as a postcard.



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[Vestealva · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well-written account of a "social network" that to us young'uns sounds as distant as it sounds irrelevant; the author explains not only its history and changes throughout time, but also the importance they once had and to some extent still has. The book is targeted to the general public, not collectors or specialists, and while it might not spark in you the desire to become either, it will make you appreciate that they exist.

[Rosemary · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love postcards and buy and send them everywhere, as the author says, when I travel, when i go to museums, for holidays and mostly when I just want to say hi and let someone know I was thinking of them. This is the author’s journey into her own world of postcards. She inherited a shoebox full of old postcards that had belonged to her grandparents from the days of Postal Carditis in the early 20th century. She includes a bit of postal history, including postcard history, but this is mostly her own discoveries of her own family’s relationship with postcards. She compares postcards to Instagram as a social network, and has some interesting tidbits and postcard photographs; fun and interesting.

[Paul · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting and informative, although a little dry at times. But then how exciting can you expect a book about the history of postcards to be? If you have an interest in postcards and would like to know more about their place in human culture, this is worth a read.

[Ken · Rating 4 out of 5]

What an interesting view of the sending and receiving of postcards, and the comparison to the instant online communication methods of today. I prefer postcards.

[Terry Meier · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very interesting history of the golden age of postcards up to today. The comparison to Instagram is apropos. Includes interesting history of paper, writing and networks.

[Graham Clayton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Full of colour images, Pyne’s book traces the history of postcards and how they became a critical means of connecting people with each other, and also with places and ideas. Deceptively simple objects, postcards left an indelible and intricate mark on the history of human communication — part of the first worldwide social network. As someone who used postcards to play correspondence chess for many years, I found this book fascinating and entertaining.