From: The Grand Rapids Press
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| It's a tree from Grand Rapids. Or the water filtration plant. It's difficult to tell. |
Not only do people in England know about bad postcards, they know about bad Grand Rapids postcards.
No kidding.
My new friend Linda Foster sent an email with a scan of this wonderfully bad postcard of a tree. Lurking behind the tree appears to be the Grand Rapids water filtration plant. Because nothing says “Wish you were here” like a water filtration plant.
“Greetings from England,” Linda wrote. “As an expat almost 18 years removed from my hometown I like to check the GR Press website once in a while – but I always check on Saturday to see what ghastly postcard you've come up with for the week.
Attached is my candidate for Bad Postcard. Looking for something I found a bunch of old postcards in a box and this was one of the few from Michigan.”
The card reads: “Number 231. Filtration Plant, Grand Rapids, Mich. Published by Will P. Canaan Co., Grand Rapids, Mich.”
“A filtration plant doesn't spring to my mind immediately as a subject for a postcard but the postmark on the back is March 10, 1913, so I would imagine the filtration plant was a big thing in 1913,” Linda wrote.
“The person sending the card, Chas, says he is rooming at 52 Barclay St. in Grand Rapids and the card, with a green 1 cent stamp, was sent to someone named Minnie in Ionia. If this card is number 231 it makes me wonder, what other things are in the series published by Canaan Co.?”
That’s a great question. And Chas and Minnie sound like swell folks, But I wanted to know more about Linda, especially since current Grand Rapidians have had enough with water, filtered or otherwise, to last for a long time. How did a Grand Rapidian end up across the pond? Does she ever get to see Pippa, the coolest of the royals?
“I moved here in September 1995 to marry my British husband and England has become my home,” she explained.
“I live just outside Portsmouth on the south coast. Less than 5 miles from my house is a place called Portchester Castle which is a 12th century castle and church built inside the walls of an old Roman fort. The church, St. Mary’s, was founded in 1186 and is still used every Sunday for services, although the castle has fallen to ruin and part of the moat is gone. Winchester Cathedral is about 45 minutes away (Two hours on the No. 69 bus with my free senior bus pass) and Stonehenge is about an hour and a half drive. Stonehenge has been voted the most over-rated tourist attraction in the country.”
That makes sense, because Stonehenge looked pretty small in “This is Spinal Tap.” But a Stonehenge postcard would be awesome!
Thank you for sharing, Linda!
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