Postcards from the Box, No. 1

Victoria, B.C. → Ladner, B.C. — June 1905

Somewhere between an estate sale and a landfill, a hundred years of correspondence survived — until I found it by chance in a small wooden Mendel’s chocolate box on a shelf in an antique store more than ten years ago.

Inside sat dozens of postcards written in the early years of the twentieth century, most addressed to a family in Ladner, British Columbia. Some travelled only a few miles. Others crossed countries. Together, they preserve small moments that might otherwise have disappeared with the people who wrote them.

This is the oldest postcard in the collection — and the one that opens the story.

It was mailed from Victoria, British Columbia, on Vancouver Island, on June 25, 1905, and addressed to S. Brown and Annie Brown, Ladner, B.C. Two days later, on June 27, it was postmarked again upon arrival in Ladner — a small but satisfying detail, since it means the card’s entire journey can still be traced from the postmarks stamped on its own back.

The front shows a dramatic black-and-white view of a waterfall crashing between steep, tree-lined cliffs. Printed along the bottom is the caption:

“Montmorency Falls.”

It is an odd choice of image for a card mailed from Victoria. Montmorency Falls lies on the far side of the country, just outside Quebec City. The card was published by W. G. MacFarlane of Toronto, one of the era's most prolific postcard publishers, whose catalogue ran to thousands of scenic views printed and distributed across the country. A sender picking up postcards at a Victoria stationer's counter in 1905 was just as likely to find a Quebec waterfall as a local landmark — the image had little to do with where the card was sold, and everything to do with what MacFarlane happened to be printing that year.

The message itself is short and warm.

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published

To Annie,
With kindest
regards and best wishes for a
pleasant vacation.
R. W. Fleming

Above the message, printed in bold capital letters, is the label

PRIVATE POST CARD.

In 1905, this simply identified the card as a privately published postcard rather than official government postal stationery. It said nothing about privacy (anyone who handled the postcard could read the message). Read today, the label feels oddly ironic.

The card leaves nothing to chance. One side of the back is labelled, “This space may be used for correspondence.” The other, “This space is for address only.” The layout that now seems ordinary was still relatively new. In December 1903, the Canadian Post Office authorized postcard publishers to reserve a space for correspondence to the left of the address, separated from it by a vertical line.

A one-cent stamp carried the card through the postal system.

At the time, Victoria was the capital of British Columbia and a busy port city connected by regular steamer service to communities throughout the province, including Ladner on the Fraser River.

By 1905, steamer service connected Victoria to the Lower Mainland, including a route that called directly at Ladner, as well as connections through New Westminster or Vancouver. A journey that could easily have occupied most of a day in 1905 takes about two and a half hours today to travel from Ladner to Victoria by ferry and road.

In June 1905, Ladner was still a relatively new farming community on the Fraser River delta, its fields turning green ahead of the summer harvest. News from the wider world arrived by steamer, telegram and the pages of The Delta Times. A telephone was still a rarity in most homes, and a radio in none at all. Ninety kilometres south across the water, Victoria bustled as the provincial capital, its harbour full of steamships and its streets lined with shops and hotels serving travellers passing through.

Nothing more is known about R. W. Fleming in the rest of the box (at least not yet).

What is known is this: on a summer day in 1905, someone named R. W. Fleming in Victoria chose a postcard showing a waterfall on the far side of the country, wrote a handful of kind words to Annie Brown, and mailed it across the Strait of Georgia. Two days later it arrived in Ladner.

It is the earliest voice in the box.

Reader corrections welcome. I'm researching this collection as an interested amateur, not a historian — if something here is wrong, I'd genuinely like to know.

Next week in Postcards from the Box

A postcard from Los Angeles introduces E. S. Brown, a man whose name quietly threads its way through the rest of the collection.

Date mailed: June 25, 1905 (Victoria)
Date received: June 27, 1905 (Ladner postmark)
Recipients: S. Brown and Annie Brown, Ladner, B.C.
Sender: R. W. Fleming Card type: Private Post Card
Publisher: W. G. MacFarlane, Toronto. The company published thousands of scenic postcards from across Canada, making it entirely possible for a postcard purchased in Victoria to depict Montmorency Falls near Quebec City.
Image: Montmorency Falls, Quebec
Postage: One-cent Canadian stamp
Stamp detail: King Edward VII in coronation robes (Scott #89), issued July 1, 1903 (part of the first Canadian series to feature Edward VII, replacing the Victorian maple-leaf design with Tudor crowns in the upper corners).

A running list of names that appear in the box. Updated as new postcards are added to the series.

• Annie L. Brown, recipient of this postcard. Addressed here simply as “Annie Brown,” alongside S. Brown. First appearance: No. 1.

• S. Brown, co-recipient of this postcard, alongside Annie Brown. First appearance: No. 1.

• R. W. Fleming, sender of this postcard, from Victoria, B.C. Nothing further is known about him yet. First appearance: No. 1.

• Postcard in the author’s collection (primary source)

• City of Delta – About Delta

• City of Delta – Delta Heritage Passport, Volume 1

• UBC Open Collections – The Delta Times (1905)

• Library and Archives Canada

• BC Archives, Royal BC Museum

Primary Government Source
Canada, Post Office Department. Report of the Postmaster General for the Year Ended 30 June 1904.

Postal Regulation
Canadian Official Postal Guide, December 1903. Regulation quoted in the Heritage Place Museum’s history of Canadian postcards.

Philatelic Sources
Ottawa Philatelic Society — confirms the July 1, 1903 issue date, the coronation-robes design, and the Tudor crowns replacing the Victorian maple-leaf corners.

Stamps and Canada stampsandcanada.com and Arpin Philately — stamp dealer and catalogue sites; sources for the Scott #89 catalogue number.

Postcard Publisher
VintagePostcards.ca. W. G. MacFarlane.

Toronto Postcard Club. W. G. MacFarlane: The Man and the Business.

Know anything about R. W. Fleming from Victoria BC in 1905 or the Brown family of Ladner? I'd love to hear from you.