COLLECTOR’S PARADISE
Upstate postcard club brings people together
TROY >> The Upstate New York Post Card Club presented its 43rd annual Post Card Show over the weekend, drawing many collectors and enthusiasts.
The event, held on Sunday at the Troy Elks Lodge on North Greenbush Road, was advertised as “a flea market of just post cards.”
About a dozen post card dealers from locally and throughout the Northeast came to the show with boxes upon boxes of post cards that they have accumulated from various sources over the years.
Overall, about half a million postcards were available at the local show.
All items at the show were for sale. Though they range widely in value from about 25 cents to $500, most post cards at Sunday’s event went for a few dollars each.
Post card collecting became prominent in the early 1900s, said club secretary Jim Smoak. “That’s
why there are so many available today,” he explained. “People now only just sent cards back and forth like they do today, they actually collected them and kept them in albums.”
Today, collectors typically search for post cards by subject matter or sometimes by their post marks.
“I like it for both reasons,” said Smoak, who enjoys collecting post cards from Lake George and Saratoga Springs. He has about 1,300 in his personal collection.
“It’s a tremendous hobby,” Smoak continued, noting that post card collecting can promote a lot of historical research. “The knowledge you can gain is pretty phenomenal.”
Sue Milner of Stillwater, who attended the post card show as a shopper, said what she looks for in a post card is simply whatever she likes. “I collect what makes me smile,” she said. “Basically anything that catches my eye. I really appreciate the artwork on the cards, the social history aspect. To me it’s just fascinating.”
Mileners collection is small, she said, “but it’s very eclectic.” Subject matter includes local landmarks, animals, and people.
At Sunday’s show, she found and bought a postcard of Frontier Town, and old Western theme park.
The local event had post cards from right in the Capital Region, around New York state, all throughout the country and even some foreign cards.
Aside from seeing a great deal of different post cards, there’s also a camaraderie within the post card collecting community. “This is fun,” said Albany-based dealer Paul Lyngard at Sunday’s event. “You get to see people.”
As a post card enthusiast, he hopes younger generations will see the value in post cards. “We’ve got to get more young people into it,” he said.
Lyngard has about 20,000 post cards in all, though he still considers it a small collection for a dealer.
The annual Post Card Show is the Upstate New York Post Card Club’s largest event of the year. The club, first organized in
February of 1972, meets twice each year.
Anyone interested in joining the Upstate New York Post Card Club can contact club secretary Jim Smoak at jsmoak@nycap. rr.com.