Cards by publisher
Some cards appear to have had multiple companies involved in their publication and photography, and so appear in multiple sections.
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A.E.H. London
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A.O.S.
I'm not 100% certain but I suspect that the cards marked A.O.S. are more likely to be correctly attributed to Alfred Savage, Oxford, than the cards marked FSO.
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Bamforth & Co Ltd
Bamforth & Co Ltd was started in 1870 by James Bamforth. They are best known for saucy seaside postcards. At the time of writing they still exist, although they appear to be dormant and have not been doing trading.
I only have a single real photo postcard from this publisher.
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Bayliss and Co.
Bayliss and Co. had a stop at 5 Market Place, as well as a printing works at 53 Stert Street. Their shop is often visible in postcards, hiding between the arches of the county hall. It's not clear what happened to them but it seems likely that they had some connection with Burgess and Sons who ended up operating out of the same premises by 1905.
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Blum & Degen
Blum and Degen were a very early postcard company notable for their "Kromo" series.
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E.T.W. Dennis
E.T.W. Dennis and Sons of Scarborough were among the first companies to produce picture postcards after regulations were relaxed in 1894. They continued in operation until 2000 after 140 years in business. The two E.T.W. Dennis cards in my collection are the earliest I've found printed using the half-tone process. Both have undividied backs, both were sent overseas, and both are identified by the letters ETWD in the bottom left of the image.
- 19020321-Abingdon
- 19020611-AbingdonRiver (duplicate)
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Edward J. Burrow and Co.
Edward Burrow was an engraver, and founded a printing and publishing firm in Cheltenham.
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Frank Smith
Frank Smith was an Oxford stationer, based out of 56 High Street, Oxford. Many of his postcards are marked "Printed in Treves" and have a small six digit serial number - indicative of being printed by Schaar & Dathe, Germany.
Byatt tentatively attributes the "F.S.O." "Heraldic Series" of postcards to Alfred Savage Ltd (also of Oxford). I've been unable to confirm this attribution. The only advertisement of a "Heraldic Series" in the local press are of those published by Tuck and Sons, and a series by Frank Smith (Oxford Chronicle and Reading Gazette, 7th September 1906). I'm proposing that F.S.O. is Frank Smith Oxford.
The list of publisher's initials available here attributes FSO to Savage, but without a quoted source I assume it was Byatt. -
Frith
Frances Frith was an early photographer. In 1859 he started the company "Frances Frith and Co" which specialised in photographic publication. He took the early photos himself, but later hired people and established a postcard company. The company closed in 1971, but the remaining assets were bought and preserved by the "Francis Frith Collection".
Photographs from Frith also appear on cards by Wrench. WH Hooke appears to have sold some cards by Frith.
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GPO
Before 1st Setpember 1894 all postcards were produced by the Post Office. They consisted of a simple card, with the address on one side and the message on the other. Postage was pre-paid. I'm mostly interested in photographic cards, so have only collected this as an example.
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Hughes
Hughes was a printer and bookseller operating out of the market place in the building now occupied by Starbucks (number 14).
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John Walker & Co
John Walker founded his publishing company in 1880 in London. Their early postcards largely focused on geography, with a wide coverage of every town in England.
The postcards I've collected are all printed with half-tone process and identified by a red anchor symbol printed on the back between the letters POST and CARD. They appear to represent a single series of cards published late in 1903 or early 1904.
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Misch & Co
Misch and Co were notable for the quality of their reproduction of photographs in colour. They first published cards under this name in 1905. The company appears to have gone bankrupt by 1916 as the German born owner of the company, Max Misch, was unable to obtain further supplies from Germany.
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P.O. Collier
Phillip Osborne Collier was a photographer based in Reading. The Museum of English Rural Life had an extensive collection of his photographs included a dated catalogue of images used in these postcards. There are a total of 13 images of Abingdon, numbered between 2000 and 2063.
All my Osborne postcards are real photos.
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Rotary Photographic Co
The Rotary Photographic Company was founded in 1901 and traded until 1916 by some accounts. Many of their postcards are real photos of actresses and actors.
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Scottish Photographic touring and Pictorial Postcard Co
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Shurey's
Charles Shurey published a series of postcards that were included with various 'penny dreadful' magazines that included serialised stories.
- 19090102-AbingdonGateway
- Valentines-36312-MarketPlace (duplicate)
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T Leach
Thomas Leach was an Abingdon printer who opened a shop in bath street in 1901. The business is still operating on Abingdon Business Park.
I only have a single postcard from T. Leach, from late 1905. The postcard was produced by a collotype process.
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Taunt & Co
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The Photocrom Co Ltd
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Unidentified
These are postcards where I'm yet to identify the publisher. The real-photo cards in this section all appear to be produced for individual customers.
There is at least one series of postcards contained in this section - those consisting of a collotype image and a red caption on the front side, and burgundy coloured print on the divided back. The examples I've collected are dated 1903-1904.
- 19030711-AbingdonStHelens
- 19040818-AbingdonStHelens (duplicate)
- 19041221-SpringTerrace
- 19050501-AbingdonSteamFireEngine
- 19050627-AbingdonGeneralView
- 19050714-SchoolYard
- 19060116-AbingdonOnThames
- 19060408-GFPalmer
- 19060709-Townhall
- 19061106-87LowerRadley
- 19070601-HighStreet
- 19070619-TheCauseway
- 19070827-ParkRoad
- 19080207-MarketPlace
- 19080426-TheSnowPlough
- 19080610-WinterWedding
- 19090610-ConduitRoad
- 19100610-ParkRoad
- 19100809-StevensTeaGardens
- 19120208-MobbsandSon
- 19120503-AbbeyChimney
- 19120503-AbbeyFirePlace
- 19120503-AbbeyRuins
- 19121008-TheFair
- 19121014-SpringRoad
- AbingdonYMCAHarriers1913
- BridgeTeaGdns
- EastStHelen-undated
- NagsHeadGroup
- TheBlizzardBroadStreet
- TheGateWayBehind
- ThePloughPump
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Unknown A
I'm unsure of the publisher of these cards but I've grouped them as a clear series of similar cards by the same publisher. They are all collotypes where the photo does not fill the front of the card. The text on the front is a bright red, and the text on the back is burgundy.
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Unknown B
These cards are printed in half-tone, with an image that doesn't fill the entire front of the card. They have hand written titles in the lower left corner of the image and the reverse states "PICTORIAL POST CARD".
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Unknown C (frame)
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Unknown D (Blizzard)
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Valentines
Valentine and Sons was a printing company founded in Dundee in 1851. They started selling topographic photographs as souvenirs and in 1897 entered into the postcard business. They were hugely successful, selling up to 1 million postcards a week. Their practice of issuing each image a serial number, and the preservation of their registers of images by St Andrew's University, makes it easy to identify and date their photographs and identify "missing" cards.
Many of the photographs are reused in different series of postcards, printed with different technologies. Sometimes the reused images are heavily cropped or combined into multi-view cards. Their popularity, and ease of identification, means that I've acquired many of their cards.
Cards of Abingdon from this period are numbered 1896:25168-25180, 1901:36302-36321 (ex 36308), 1907:57164-57165,60082-60087.
- 19011231-AbingdonLock
- 19030406-MarketPlace
- 19030603-StHelens
- 19030720-TheBridge
- 19040611-AbbeyGateAbingdon
- 19040623-StMichaelsChurch
- 19040910-StHelensAbingdon (duplicate)
- 19040923-ParkRoad
- 19041219-AbingdonWest
- 19050217-AbbeyGate
- 19050912-EastStHelen
- 19050929-AbingdonWest (duplicate)
- 19051111-AbingdonLock
- 19070719-HighStreet
- 19071224-AbingdonSouthWest
- 19080122-TownHall
- 19081119-AlbertPark
- 19090821-Comp
- 19100121-TheThamesAtAbingdon
- 19120713-TheBridge
- Valentines-25169-StNicholasChurch
- Valentines-25169-StNicholasChurchCrop (duplicate)
- Valentines-25171-ChristsHospital
- Valentines-25173-MarketHall
- Valentines-25176-TheBridge
- Valentines-36302-AbingdonFromTheBridge
- Valentines-36309-GrammarSchool
- Valentines-36311-TheBridge
- Valentines-36312-MarketPlace (duplicate)
- Valentines-36312-MarketPlace-Undivided (duplicate)
- Valentines-36315-ConduitRoad
- Valentines-36319
- Valentines-36321-StMichaels (duplicate)
- Valentines-60083-AbingdonChurch
- Valentines-60084-RiverThames
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WH Hooke
William Hooke was a stationer and printer, operating out of 17 Market Place/8 Stert Street. WH Hooke eventually became Abbey Press which closed in 2006. One of their postcards appears to be licensed from Valentine and Son.
The earliest postcard I've been able to reliably date is from March 1904. All have divided backs, and all but one the postcards are printed using the collotype process. WH Hooke also appears to have sold cards using images from Frith and Valentine.
- 19041019-ParkAvenue
- 19050801-AbingdonStHelensFromtheBridge
- 19050816-MarketPlace
- 19060111-AboveTheBridge
- 19060922-HighStreet
- 19080425-StHelensChurchfromBridge
- 19090520-AbingdonAboveTheBridge (duplicate)
- 19090929-MarketPlace
- 19100810-LandingStage
- 19101219-TheAbbeyGateway
- 19110617-AlmsHouses
- 19111104-MarketPlace (duplicate)
- 19120713-TheBridge
- 19121215-AbingdonAboveTheBridge (duplicate)
- 19130828-Multiview
- AbingdonTownHall
- FrithHook-StHelens (duplicate)
- WHHooke-Comp
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Warland Andrew
Frank Warland Andrew was an Abingdon photographer who operated from 1 Stert Street, and lived in Conduit Road, Spring Terrace and Park Road.
I only have a single real photo postcard from this publisher.
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Wrench
Wrench postcards were published from 1900-1904 John Evelyn Leslie Wrench. For a short time they were one of the largest publishers of postcards in the country but quickly over expanded with too much money tied up in stock. The company eventually closed down, but was reformed from 1904-1906 as Wrench Postcards Ltd.
Wrench postcards appear to be particularly prevalent among early undivided postcards of Abingdon. All printed using a collotype process. I've been able to attribute two of the photographs used to Frith. It's likely that the third is also from the same company.
- 19010717-AbingdonWrench186
- 19021001-AbingdonWrench465
- 19021006-AbingdonWrench466
- 19021021-AbingdonWrench465 (duplicate)
- 19050714-Abingdon (duplicate)
- 19051221-TheTownHall (duplicate)
- Wrench3816