“Dear Mother, Am feeling fine, as hard as a rock and as brown as an Indian”: More Postcards from the US-Mexico Border Circa 1916

It’s a hazard in rare book nerderie: the ephemera bug bit me! I’m just back from the Center for Big Bend Studies Conference at Sul Ross State University in Alpine (Far West Texas), where I presented on “John Bigelow, Jr.,” about which a longer post is forthcoming, but in the meantime, fresh from that book fair with its bodacious selection of ephemera, herewith, thanks to Galvan Creek Postcards, a few additions to my burgeoning collection of Texas postcards from the era of WWI and the Mexican Revolution:

“ARMY MANEUVERS ON THE MEXICAN BORDER”

Postmark:
MARFA, TEX
OCT 10
 2PM
1916

TEXT:
 hellow Jack
how are you I am fine & dandy.
Well I rec your letter
OK but I am still in the war
Well regards to all Your friend LB [?]

Jack Hendrix
Medicine Mound
Tex 

“BORDER DUTY ON THE RIO GRANDE” (REVERSE BLANK)
“MOUNTED SCOUTS; THE WAGON TRAIN”

Postmark:
EL PASO, TEX
AUG 30
1916

TEXT:

Will write a latter lato
[? ? ?]

El Paso Texas
August 29, 1916
Dear Burt:
Rec you letter
and was glad to hear
from you they have everything
in the stores down here that
they have have in Mass but they have a
lot of Mexican things here that they
dont have in Mass we had Gov inspection
this morning but i passed alright the
[?] R F D got excellent love to all
Albert

Mrs Elmer Loving
Palmer Road
Halifax
Mass

“BOYS IN KAKHI GUARDING THE RIO GRANDE”
“W.H. HORNE CO. EL PASO, TEX. U.S. CAVALRY DRILL”
“FORT BLISS, TEXAS”

POSTMARK:
PHARR, TEX
SEPT 20
1916

Sept 19 ’16
Dear Mother:
Am feeling fine
and as hard as a
rock and brown
as an Indian. Just
3 months ago tonight
we were called out
Remember? How
is every thing and
every one? L.A.B.

Mrs F.G. Ball
11489 N. Main
Jamestown,
N.Y.

> See also my previous post, Postcards from the US-Mexico Border of Yore.

P.S. My favorite rare book dealer blog is Greg Gibson’s Bookman’s Log. Watch out, these rare book and emphemera guys are dangerous. If he ever scares up a Manhattan clipper ship card…

Further Notes on John Bigelow, Jr. (1854-1936): On the Bloody Trail of Geronimo: the Rare Westernlore Press Edition

Top 13 Trailers for Movies with Extra-Astral Texiness

Translating Across the Border

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