Directory W

Wahler & Schwarz

Stuttgart, Germany

Wahler & Schwarz Kunstanstalt, Stuttgart Kunstler-Postkarten

Wahler & Schwarz, art postcard publishers and printers, Stuttgart published religious and patriotic cards into the divided-back era. Mr Wahler published undivided-backs advertising Cacao Moser Roth of Stuttgart. During WWI, by then owned by L Messing, the business produced propaganda cards featuring artists H. Wenng and C. H. Münch. Wahler & Schwarz produced trade cards and collectable stamps for Lahusen’s pharmacy of Bremen, particularly their Jodella cod liver oil.

Louis Wain

ERNEST NISTER, LONDON

Louis William Wain (5 August 1860 to 4 July 1939) was an English artist best known for his drawings, which consistently featured anthropomorphized large-eyed cats and kittens. Later in life, he was confined to mental institutions and was alleged to have suffered from schizophrenia. Ernest Nister (qv) published books and prints of his drawings.

Further reading: Cute Cats and Psychedelia: The Tragic Life of Louis Wain

Cliché Walery, Paris

Cliché WALERY
WALERY PARIS Papier Guilleminot

The Walery photographic studio, 9 bis rue de Londres, Paris was started by Stanislaw Julian Count Ostrorog (1834 to 1890) who named it after his wife Waleria. He traded in London and Paris and in Marseille until 1875. He was at 9 bis rue de Londres until the bankruptcy of the Loans Company in 1878. He won medals. His son Stanislaw Julian Ignacy Ostrorog (1863 to 1929) ran rue de Londres until his death in 1929. This would make him responsible for the early postcards albeit they may use his father’s images. Parisian Charles Auguste Varsavaux (30 September 1866 to 20 April 1935) succeeded to the Paris studio and used the name Walery which was a lucrative brand at the time. From 1890 to 1918 Walery was in partnership with the prominent English photographer Alfred Ellis (qv).

This card: R. Guilleminot, Bœspflug et Cie, Paris, was a photographic paper and plate manufacturer established by Gustave Guilleminot in 1858. It was the oldest maker of light-sensitive materials in the world when it closed in 1994. Employee Guy Gerard, a chemical engineer for 30 years, went on to start a new company, Bergger.

The Alcazar d’Été was a Café-concert which opened in 1869, at 8 Avenue Gabriel in Paris, and closed in 1914. Miss Williams was one of the performers.

Sources: A fourth Walery photographer: Walery Mroczkowski aka Ostroga Mrouk With the contribution of Jean Catherine; Melle de Rougé, ca1910, photographie sur papier argentique au format cabinet par …

A.& S. Walker

Manchester, England

A.& S. Walker, Manchester

A.& S. Walker, stationers and paper manufacturer based in Manchester published One hundred and one views, Manchester and district and other books of pictures of the area. They published monochrome photo-cards of Manchester into the divided back era.

By 1919 they were A & S Walker, Ltd., stationers. By the 1920s, they were Artistic and Heraldic Stationers at St Ann’s Passage Corner, 2 Victoria Street, 31 & 68 Market Street, 62 King Street. This last was their print works where they were still engaged in letterpress printing in the 1950s. Unlike the non-union DC Thomson, printing staff at Walkers were members of the Typographical Society of Manchester. Walkers printed the programme for the reception of the Prime Minister of New Zealand at Manchester City Hall on 26 November 1930. In about 1935 Walkers were retailing the Conway Stewart pens including the Dandy No 81 Ink Pencil. In their time, the retail offering extended to clocks.

John Walker & Company, London

red anchor between the words Post and Card

John Walker’s postcards were printed by the Bartholomew mapmakers and included regions throughout Great Britain and some postcards of countries further afield including Australia and Canada where they published cards featuring the Canadian Pacific Railway routes. Their 1903 Geographical Series cards were numbered though earlier ones weren’t. The Geographical cards typically showed a city or town map with a black and white vignette, another benefit of the tie-in with Bartholomew. Other divided-backs were published in the Bells’ Series and bore the company name before and after incorporation. In 1904 Walkers published the earliest known picture postcards of the Turks & Caicos Islands.

Sources: National Library of Scotland; Times of the Islands.

Wall, Nichols Company Limited, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA

Published by WALL, NICHOLS CO., LTD, HONOLULU

Wall, Nichols Company Limited, Honolulu, an all-purpose store for the tourist and local alike. On 21 October, 1899 Austin’s Hawaiian Weekly presented a portrait of Mr. W. E. Sharp, who had left his musical directorship of the Orpheum Orchestra for control of the musical department of Wall, Nichols & Co where he still holds sway.

Their 1904 Hawaiian Scenic View Calendar was without any exception the handsomest Hawaiian calendar ever produced. In the Evening Bulletin of Friday 6 October 1905, they were the source of tickets for a lecture entitled Love, Courtship, Marriage and Divorce, a marriage ceremony which concluded with a demonstration through the science of Phrenology, how Inharmonious marriages are contracted.

In the Hawaiian Star of Friday 18 December 1908, when they were at Fort and Merchant Streets, the company boasted of having the Largest Stock and Greatest Assortment of toys ever to come to Honolulu. Don’t buy until you have inspected Our immense STOCK. They also published books of Hawaian music in the early years of the 20^th century. In about 1915 they published a set of playing cards promoting the islands of Hawaii which they had produced by the U.S. Playing Card Co. in Cincinnati. Many of their postcards were produced in Germany.

Source: Honolulu County, Hawaii: The Pacific Commercial Advertiser 19 November 1903

Wanderer-Verlag G.m.b.H.

Leipzig, Germany

Wanderer-Verlag, G.m.b.H., Leipzig-Connewitz

This limited company of the Connewitz district of Leipzig published a wide range of material in the first years of the 20th century, including Wanderbilder (hiking pictures) which consisted of 15 colour plates of Eisenach. Also in 1904 the business published a series of prints of young Japanese women. They published a series of travelogues, mostly by Oswald Schroeder. Their postcards included the work of Félix Bonfils, (1831 to 1885) the French photographer of the Middle East.

Marshall Wane & Co

Marshall Wane & Co
Marshall Wane & Co’s Series

Marshall Wane (1834 to 1903), photographer. Wane was active in the Isle of Man between 1863 and 1882 although it appears he left the Island to move to Edinburgh about 1876, keeping the studio in Douglas. The Manx Museum hold some 20,000 portrait negatives. In the 1860s onwards, he won awards and medals in competition as far away as France and India. In February 1888, he forewent the opportunity to compete in the Dundee Photographic Exhibition in order to be one of the judges. He opened studios at 82 George St, Edinburgh which traded as Marshall Wane & Co from 1903 following his death and, post 1907, at 130 Princes Street. A speciality was hand-coloured portraits. He also established a studio in Ayr from 1888 at 10 Alloway Place and 43 Sandgate Street. At one stage the business traded as Marshall Wane & Allan (with John Allan) but this was dissolved in 1891 and thereafter resumed under the name Marshall Wane & Co.

Sources: National Library of Scotland; Photographic News 24 February 1888; IsleofMan.com; EdinPhoto; Ayrshire History;

Warburgs Art Publishers, Copenhagen

Warburgs Kunst-Forlag

Warburgs Art Publishers published postcards and topographic images from all areas of Denmark from 1901 to 1911. After the undivided-back period, they used a logo of a monogram of WKF in a circle. They published the work of artist Hans Viggo Westergaard (1870 to 1928).

Source: fotohistorie.com

The Washington News Company, Washington DC

The Washington News Company, Washington, D.C.-Leipzig-Berlin

Washington News Company were one of the earliest Washington D.C. postcard publishers, with a shop at 616 6th Street NW. They published an early postcard of William McKinley’s memorial service in the House of Representatives Chamber in 1902.

In the 1930s the company was sued by a child injured in a road accident involving one of its salesmen of school supplies. In a leading case, his degree of independence of operation allowed the company to avoid liability on the basis that he was not an employee of the company, but an independent contractor. They published view-cards of Washington into the 1940s.

Source: Washington News Company v. Satti 169 Md. 489, 182 A. 286; history.house.gov

This card: The White House building was originally variously referred to as the President’s Palace, Presidential Mansion, or President’s House. The earliest evidence of the public calling it the “White House” was recorded in 1811. A myth emerged that during the rebuilding of the structure after the Burning of Washington, white paint was applied to mask the burn damage it had suffered, giving the building its namesake hue. The name “Executive Mansion” was used in official contexts until President Theodore Roosevelt established “The White House” as its formal name in 1901 via Executive Order. The current letterhead wording and arrangement of “The White House” with the word “Washington” centered beneath it dates to the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The style of the address side of this card suggests that it may have been printed by Samuel Langsdorf of New York (qv).

Source: wikipedia: White House

Washington Souvenir Company, Washington DC

WASHINGTON SOUVENIR CO., PUBLISHERS.

Washington Souvenir Company advertised as the HEADQUARTERS FOR SOUVENIRS OF EVERY DESCRIPTION from their shop at 1333 Pennsylvania Avenue. This was opposite Mt. Vernon Electric Railway Station, within Two Squares of the Ebbitt, Raleigh, Regent and Willard Hotels. They offered Post Cards at 2 for 5 cents, Maps at 10 cents, Redeemed Money at 15 cents, Sterling Spoons 75c. to $5.00 and Color Photographs, 25c. To $3.50. They also sold photographs in platinum and plain of the Library of Congress and Washington.

Source: Rand, McNally & Co.’s 1901 pictorial guide to Washington and environs : including complete descriptions of the Capitol, Library of Congress, White House, the departments, Mount Vernon, Arlington, and all other points of interest

A A Waterman, Trinidad

Waterman, 15 Frederick Street, Trinidad

A A Waterman, Hatter, Clothier and Outfitter, 15 Frederick Street, Port of Spain, Trinidad. Waterman published local topographicals into the divided-back era when they described him as Waterman the Hatter, Clothier and Outfitter. In 1915, Waterman’s was listed as a department store trading in buttons.

In 1893 Waterman was a member of Church of England Union for Men in Port of Spain. In about 1912 Watermans advertised:

We were the first in Trinidad to receive the world-renowned Victor Records of Lovey’s String Band. We are playing daily to large crowds and are taking orders. The very best Spanish and Creole Paseos and Walzes.

Lovey’s String Band were a Trinidadian musical group. They are known primarily for having been the earliest known calypso group to have recorded. They originally formed sometime in the 1890s and continued performing until the early 1920s. In 1912 they switched stables to record with Victor Records.

Watkins & McCombie Limited, London

Watkins & Mc. Combie Ltd., London

Watkins & McCombie Limited, London. Publishers established in 1775 and incorporated in February 1898 when they were at 7 Paternoster Row. In the Official Catalogue of the British Section for the 1878 Paris Universal International Exhibition, Watkins & McCombie featured as Quill Merchants and Sealing Wax Makers of 5a Cloak Lane and 24, College Hill. Many of their better cards of London were clearly made by Stengel (qv).

Watkins & McCombie had a kiosk at the very first Chelsea Flower Show, known then as the Royal International Horticultural Exhibition, in 1912. To mark the occasion they published a set of six postcards – undivided backs on buff coloured card including one of the vista from their own kiosk.

Source: Picture Postcards and their Publishers Anthony Byatt 1978 Golden Age Postcard Books page 329;

Wehrli Brothers, Kilchberg, Zurich

Hochgebirge-Serie Gebr. Wehrli, Kilchberg, Zürich Phot. Dr Brun
Verlag Gebr. Wehrli Phot Kilchberg-Zürich autochrom Louis Glaser, Leipzig
Phot. Gebr. Wehrli, Kilchberg-Zürich
Edition Wehrli Freres, Kilchberg-Zürich
Gebr. Wehrli, Bendlikon-Zürich
Stab. fot. Wehrli S. A., Como.

Arthur, Bruno and Harry Wehrli founded the Gebrüder Wehrli photographic shop at Kilchberg, Zurich in the mid-1890s. By 1897 they had four employees. In 1904 they took over the Fotogeschäft Bachmann (qv) in Lucerne and founded the Aktiengesellschaft Photographie-Verlag Wehrli AG. Adolf Zehnder from Kilchberg became Chairman of the Board of Directors. After the death of Harry Wehrli in 1906, Zehnder also took over the administrative management of the business.

The archives of the Wehrli brothers contain several thousand photos, which were created at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. Under extreme strain the three photographers climbed into the Hochgebirge and brought back impressive pictures. The classic Wehrli look is characterized by rich black and white colour with a great love for sharpness and precisio n. However, the importance of the photographic performance of the Wehrli brothers is also the popularization of mountain photography and the general acceptance of landscapes and settlements.

The postcards of Gebruder Wehrli were soon available in Switzerland. In 1924 Wehrli AG merged with competing publisher Photoglob of Zurich (qv). By the 1940s Geneva firm Vouga & Co (qv) had merged with Wehrli and they were publishing B&W topographical photo-cards under the names Wehrli & Vouga and Photoglob-Wehrli-Vouga. Cards crediting Wehrli S. A. in Como, Italy as photographer also bear the logo of Zurich printer and publisher Brunner (qv) who had a branch in Como.

Kilchberg is a municipality in the district of Horgen in the canton of Zürich. It grew out of the mediaeval village of Bendlikon.

Sources: fotoCH; Gebrüder Wehrli. Pioniere der Alpin-Fotografie (FotoSzeneSchweiz) Gebundene Ausgabe – 1. Mai 2005 – Gebrüder Wehrli. Pioneers of alpine photography Edited by Paul Hugger / With texts by Johannes Vogel PhotoSceneSwitzerland 1st ed., May 2005; Limmat Verlag; Photoglob Gestern und Heute

Adolphe Weick

Saint Dié des Vosges, France

Imp Ad Weick – Saint Dié
Imp. Ad. Weick, – St-Dié

Adolphe Weick (1861 to 1915) was a postcard editor photographer and bookseller based in Saint-Dié in the Vosges. Between 1899 and 1914 Weick published nearly 1,500 military-themed postcards which provide a valuable insight into the border area created by the war of 1870. Weick also published books including Captain A. Pernot’s The Fight of Sidi-Brahim and souvenir photo albums^²³. The existence of Rue Adolphe Weick in Saint Dié Des Vosges represents a recognition few postcard publishers can equal.

This card: Vaucouleurs is a commune in the Meuse department of France, located approximately 300 km from Paris and 120 km from Saint Dié Des Vosges. The Chapelle castrale de Vaucouleurs was built between 1923 and 1929, some years after this card was published. It occupies the site of the original chapel built in 1234. Under the Castle Chapel is the crypt, built like the thirteenth century original in which many witnesses have often claimed to have seen Joan of Arc.

Charles Weidner

San Francisco, California, USA

Charles Weidner, Photographer, San Francisco

Charles Weidner (22 July 1867 to 16 May 1940) 787 Market Street, San Francisco. Karl Weidner was born in Jagstheim Germany and emigrated to the US in 1888, becoming Charles thereafter. He was naturalised in 1894.

Weidner travelled relentlessly photographing San Francisco and beyond. He published hundreds of beautiful postcards of his photographs. His cards were printed in Germany, many of them the Autochrom process of Louis Glaser of Leipzig. Some cards list “Goeggel & Weidner, Publishers”.

This card was published black and white in 1903 by Goeggel & Weidner as publishers with the number 49 and, with the same number crediting Weidner alone – as photographer. This tinted number 86 has acquired a patriotic flag. The difference in designation is clearly not accidental, the inference being that Weidner alone was a photographer. Given that the cards were printed in Germany, one can conclude that Goeggel was not a printer.

In early 1902 Weidner partnered with William Goeggel (1852 to 15 September 1933). Goeggel was also born in Germany. By 1891 he had moved to northern California and settled in Woodland. On 1 November 1899, The Jewelers’ Circular reported that Goeggel, then formerly of Woodland, was a member of a new San Francisco jewelry company incorporated with a capital stock of $100,000. Goeggel died in San Francisco.

As well as the 1906 earthquake, Weidner’s topical photos included the Panama-Pacific International Exposition a world’s fair held in San Francisco from 20 February to 4 December 1915. Its stated purpose was to celebrate the completion of the Panama Canal, but it was widely seen in the city as an opportunity to showcase its recovery from the earthquake. The San Francisco Chronicle reported “… the hugest gathering of mankind the Pacific Coast has ever seen.”

Weidner’s cards (printed by Albertype of Brooklyn, N.Y.) included side-by-side photographs of 1906 and 1915. His panoramas of the Exposition are particularly fine.

When the US joined World War One, chromolitho postcards could no longer be printed in Germany and Weidner tried himself in black and white cards. But his publishing career ceased to prosper. In his later years, Weidner was a staff photographer at the San Francisco Examiner, Sunset Magazine, and Camera Craft.

Sources: An Introduction to the Panama-Pacific International Exposition
The Weidner Family; Charles Weidner Biography

E. Weil

Mainz, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.

E. Weil, Editeur, Mayence

Weil, publisher, Mainz in Germany (Mayence in French) largely seems to have produced undivided-backs for the Belgian market. His postcards of Brussels included the 1897 Exposition Universelle.

Gustav Weise, Stuttgart, Germany.

HERMANN KAULBACH-SERIE, 12 Nrn. Gustav Weise, Stuttgart.

The Gustav Weise publishing house in Stuttgart published between 1867 and 1963. In 1885 Weise printed the first edition of Der Trotskopf (The defiant head), a story for adult girls by Emmy von Rhoden who is credited with single-handedly inventing the Backfischroman, the novel for teenage girls. In 1891 Weise published a parody of Struwwelpeter of rhymes about various naughty children by Johannes Trojan illustrated with great chromolithographs by Fedor Flinzer, including Untidy Emily, Matilda the Tomboy, Conceited Lizzie, Paul the Sluggard and Unmannerly Hermann. In 1893 he also published another quality production, Gustave Weise’s Naturgeschichte in Bildern (Natural History in Pictures). In the undivided-back era Weise published postcards of the works of the Munich artist Hermann Kaulbach (qv).

F. Weiss, Buenos Aires, Argentina

IMPR. F. WEISS CALLE CHILE 1360

Weiss was one of the important postcard publishers of Buenos Aires who published photographs by leading photographer H. G. Olds (qv). Undivided-back cards were also published by J. Weiss & Cia from the same address, 1360 Calle Chile, Buenos Aires.

In 1911 Printing Weiss and Preusche published the 3rd. Edition of The Puntan Tradition by J. W. Gez. In 1918 J. Weiss y Preusche published Statutes of the German School Association Quilmes, a city in the Buenos Aires region. In 1914 the Typographic Establishment of J. Weiss & Preusche published Archive of the Argentine Nation: Documents referring to the War of Independence. In 1916 they were at 249 Calle Patricios.

As of 4 October 1918, the company was added to the Enemy Trading List by The Panama Canal, Executive Department, Division of Civil Affairs, Balboa Heights, Canal Zone.

Sources: H. G. Olds. News of an unknown Abel Alexander y Luis Priamo (Translated into English by Leigh Fisher); Panama Canal Record

William Weiss & Company

Hamilton, Bermuda

Wm. Weiss & Co., Hamilton, Bermuda.
WM. WEISS & CO., PHOTOGRAPHERS HAMILTON BERMUDA.

William Weiss, photographer and Kodak dealer, Hamilton, Bermuda. Weiss’ output included an album of forty-four large format albumen photographs of Bermuda and photocards of Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens) who was a frequent visitor to Bermuda between 1867 and 1910.

PROPERTY DAMAGED IN REID STREET. Shortly after midnight yesterday Mr William Weiss, whose photographic’ studio is situated on Reid Street, was startled by a sound of something falling. He occupies rooms above his studio and on going to the window noticed that the iron railing just a few feet to the westward of his premises had been broken down and that the shattered, remains were scattered about the pavement. There were some half dozen more or less drunken revellers just at this spot when Mr. Weiss looked out of the window and it is his opinion that the outrage was perpetrated by them. He at once shouted “Police” and then came downstairs and made his way down Reid Street and into Queen Street as far down as Heyl’s Corner but could find no trace of any policeman. On returning to his rooms he tried to get into telephonic communication with the Police Station but there was no response from the Central Office. It was then ten minutes after twelve. Lawlessness and drunkenness are continually on the increase in Bermuda, and though efforts at suppression are undoubtedly being made they seem to be meeting with but scant success. We suggested a short time ago that special constables should be sworn in and the need of such is becoming increasingly manifest.
The Royal Gazette and Colonist Daily, Wednesday 19 January 1921

Weiss’s dark room and studio on the Bermuda Press premises on Reid Street, between the Womans Shop and the Cooper Building were sold for demolition in 1934.

This card: What is now the Royal Palms Hotel was built as a grand private home in 1903 a short distance from the centre of Hamilton. The City of Hamilton, in Pembroke Parish, is the territorial capital of the British Overseas Territory of Bermuda. It is the territory’s financial centre and a major port and tourist destination. Its population of 854 in 2016 was one of the smallest of any capital city.

Joseph Welch & Sons

Portsmouth, England

J.W. & S.

Joseph Welch & Sons’ business ran from 1864 to 1936, originally as a photographic publishing concern, and published some books of views of South Coast towns. They were at 5 Cheapside, Lake Road, Portsmouth in 1898 and 359 Commercial Road by 1901.

Among the millions of cards produced by this firm during the Golden Age is one depicting a naval officer, complete with stick, in a schoolmasterly stance apparently lecturing a small white dog sitting obediently on a desk top. On a blackboard in the background a caption is written: “On the knee!” You won’t! then 5 years bread and water. The earliest postmark on one of their cards is dated 26 August 1898 and the 2023 edition of the Picture Postcard Annual records the earliest posting of divided-back as one of their cards on 25 August 1902.

Sources: ukpostcard.co.nz; Picture Postcard Annual 2023

Weldon Limited, London

EDWARD VII CORONATION SOUVENIR POST CARDS Presented with WELDON’S BAZAAR OF CHILDREN’S FASHIONS June 1902

The 1922 Newspaper Press Directory lists Weldon Ltd of 30 to 32 Southampton Street, Strand, WC as publishers of Weldon’s Bazaar of Children’s Fashions having Instructions for Making Children’s Dresses at Home as its distinctive features and a cover price of 4d. Weldons were also listed as publishing a number of other sewing publications.

A souvenir of Edward VII’s Coronation in June 1902

Western Mail, Perth, W.A., Australia

“Western Mail” Perth, W.A.

Published from 1885 to 1955, the Western Mail was published up to 1896 as a joint venture by Charles Harper and John Winthrop Hackett, the co-owners of The West Australian, the State’s major daily paper. It was printed by James Gibbney at the paper’s office in St Georges Terrace. Hackett and Harper still owned both papers in 1901 when Hackett was the editor-in-chief and managing director of the West Australian” Newspaper Co., Ltd and a Member of the Legislative Council, part of the Parliament of Western Australia. The paper continued to be published by the publishers of the West Australian.

In 1904 William Catton Grasby, an influential Australian agricultural journalist and educationist reported prophetically on agricultural and fruit-growing possibilities for the Western Australian government and from 1905 he was the agricultural editor of the Western Mail and West Australian. He gained a huge following for his weekly advice column for farmers^³¹. The newspaper published photo view cards of western Australia into the divided-back era.

Sources: wikipedia; Western Mail 1 March 1902; Australian Dictionary of Biography

The Western News Company, Chicago, IL, USA

The Western News Company, Chicago
The Western News Company, Chicago, Berlin and Leipzig

The Western News Company, wholesale newsagent and bookseller, 123 State Street, Chicago was established by John R. Walsh, by 1867. Less than ten years later, it was one of the institutions of Chicago with a turnover of three-quarters of a million dollars. The Company of was among the main sufferers in the Great Fire of Chicago in October 1871. In the ruins of the Company’s premises, among the immense stock of periodicals and books reduced to ashes, there was found a single leaf of a quarto Bible containing the first chapter of the Lamentations of Jeremiah^³⁴. Walsh sold part ownership of his Company to the American News Company and Western News became a branch operation. Their postcards included local topographicals and pictures of women seaside bathers.

Sources: As Others See Chicago: Impressions of Visitors, 1673-1933 Bessie Louise Pierce, Joe Lester Norris University of Chicago Press, 29 May 2004, page 121; Chicago Tribune Friday 13 October 1871; The Donaldsonville Chief newspaper 4 November 1871

Josef Weth, Landeck, Tyrol, Austria

Verlag Jos. Weth, Buchhandlung in Landeck. Rafael Neuber, Wien-Berlin. E. DOCKER

Josef Weth, bookseller in Landeck. In 1903 Weth ran the only bookshop in Landeck. He also traded in photographic articles and fancy goods including set of a dozen fan-shaped correspondence cards. His postcards of photographs of the locality were produced by Rafael Neuber (qv) of Vienna and Berlin elegantly framed in drawings by Eduard Döcker.

Wetterwald Freres

Bordeaux, Gironde, France

Wetterwald Freres, Bordeaux

Wetterwald Freres, printers, 110 Cours St Louis, Bordeaux. Generations of the Wetterwald family have been printers in Bordeaux. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the great chateaux of Bordeaux identified their bottles by colour or paint dabs. The Imprimerie Wetterwald offered them a major development in the industry, personalised and finely-decorated labels. The business produced labels for spirits, wines and liqueurs. At the turn of the century they produced stylish advertising and promotional materials for their own and other people’s products.

In 1901 the company published the Bordeaux Short Story Writer's Almanac and in 1912, Abbot Rene Delaplanche’s lectures on Political Atheism. In 1921 the company printed the notgeld issued by the Bordeaux Chamber of Commerce.

Bordeaux is a port city on the river Garonne in southwestern France. With its castles and vineyards on the hillsides of the Gironde departement, the Bordeaux region is home to the world’s main wine fair, Vinexpo.

Sources: Wetterwald Family Chronicle;

Charles E. Weyand & Company

New York

CHAS E. WEYAND & CO., 22 HOWARD ST.. N. Y.

Chas E. Weyand & Company, 22-26 Howard St, New York. In the 1916 Wanamaker Diary they advertised with the slogan YOUR CORRESPONDENCE WILL BE CORRECT IN EVERY DETAIL IF YOU USE COMMONWEALTH LAWN which I guess to be writing paper. The Wanamaker Diary wasn’t just a diary, but a miniature catalogue and social guidebook that was originally published for the John Wanamaker stores … complete with guides to local theatres, postal rates, holidays, and much more!. In 1922 Weyand advertised for staff: GIRLS EXPERIENCED IN FINE STATIONERY; GOOD PAY; STEADY WORK. GIRLS learn in stationery factory, neat, light handiwork; steady all year; good pay. My card of theirs was Copyright 1905, a cartoon of a couple initialled C.C.W. with the motto

If you continue to decline,

And will not be my Valentine,

I know someone who will do,

Every bit as well as you.

Sources: The Brooklyn Daily Eagle 31 May 1918; Daily News 12 September 1922

Wharton & Company, England

Wharton & Co.’s Series

Samuel John Wharton (1874 to 1944) was a Peterborough photographer whose distinctive products included cartes de visite reproducing entries from the births and wedding columns of The Times newspaper. These bore the name “Wharton and Co Peterborough” Samuel’s older brother Herbert Charles Wharton (born 1869) was also a photographer in Kilburn, London. He also produced cartes de visite with Times newspaper notices. A real photocard of Thorney Abbey in Cambridgeshire has SJW 14 on the face of the card after the title appears making it highly likely this was Samuel’s work. It is difficult to say which of the brothers produced my card of Hampstead Heath with the attribution above.

Wheaton & Company

Exeter, England

Wheaton’s Series
A. WHEATON & CO’S SERIES.

Still trading, A. Wheaton and Company is one of the oldest, companies in Exeter. It can be traced back to 1780, when James Penny opened a bookshop and printer in Southgate Street. William Wheaton purchased the business on 2 July 1835. An 1844 Old Moore’s Almanac has Wheaton’s adverts for school books and patent medicines. William died in 1846 and the business was taken over by his widow and, soon after, his son, Alfred Wheaton. In 1851, Alfred also died, and the business passed to his sisters, Mary and Anne and, in due course, their nephew, Alfred.

Disaster struck in 1882 when their shop in Fore Street along with several surrounding premises was destroyed by what is known as The Great Exeter Fire. The replacement building was the first in Exeter to have a lift. In 1901 they acquired S. Lee and Company, a small printing works at 1 Preston Street. The works at this time was producing labels, magazines and general trade printing. Their Wheaton’s Series postcards were local topographicals. In 1906, the business was incorporated as a limited company. The first venture into educational publishing and printing was in 1910 when they produced a set of observation drawing cards.

Alfred retired in 1928 at the age of 76. Like many successful Victorian businessman, he was active in politics as a Liberal and a keen congregationalist^³⁷. In 1914 they published Downside Abbey and School, 1814-1914, illustrated in Photogravure by D. Leo Almond. After various adventures including being taken over by Robert Maxwell, Wheatons is now known as Polestar Wheatons and remain the country’s largest educational and scientific printers.

Walter G. Wheeler & Company, London, EC

WALTER G. WHEELER & CO., LONDON

The artist appears to be S N Bresch whom I have not managed to trace.

Walter G. Wheeler & Company, religious publisher, 17 Paternoster Row, London. In about 1902 Wheeler published Garenganze: West And East by F S Arnot, an account of over 20 years missionary work in Central Africa. In the Churchman Advertiser of December 1902 they advertised as the publisher of The Puritan Quarterly. Many of their postcards featured fine pictures of flowers by good artists such as Clara von Sivers (qv) and, in the divided-back era, Catharina Klein (qv).

Meta. C. Whishaw

M.C.W. Raphael Tuck & Sons “CONNOISSEUR” Series 2557 Chromographed in Berlin. ART PUBLISHERS TO THEIR MAJESTIES THE KING AND QUEEEN.

Meta C. Whishaw (born Meta C Lovgren in 1874) British artist. Meta Whishaw married Alexander Yeams Whishaw (1870 to 1946). Their son Eric Breton Whishaw was born in 1903 and their daughter Constance Enid Armstrong was born in 1908.

Alexander Y. Whishaw was a British painter active between 1894 and 1914. In 1910 he was invited to join the Lake Artists Society.

This card was also published as Tuck’s CHRISTMAS Series 1900 with the additional words A HAPPIE NEWE YEARE and featured in their 1904/1905 catalogue.

Source: Tuck DB Postcards

E.M. White

Davenport, Scott County, Iowa, USA

Published by E.M. White, Davenport, Iowa

E.M. White, Bookseller and Stationer, Davenport. On 7 March 1890, the Davenport Democrat newspaper reported that Mrs. E.M. White had returned from Manchester, Ia, where she had been attending her parents’ silver wedding anniversary.

In 1910 E. M. WHITE Bookseller 406 Brady St. Davenport, Iowa was advertised in Huebinger’s Map and Guide for River to River Road : “Sells All Road Maps Complete Line of Periodicals Subscriptions Taken”

On the night of 21 November 1913, burglars broke into a number of shops in Davenport. Fifty dollars in cash and articles valued at $350 were taken from Bruno Zoeckler’s Stationery Store at 316 W. 2nd St. store. The thieves also hit the E. M. White Book Store where $450 worth of loot was reported missing including a large number of silver letter openers. The culprits were unsuccessful at entering the W. C. Bolte Confectionery Store, 404 Brady St. and the Louis P. Carstens Pharmacy, 312 Brady St., where doors and windows were tampered with, but the thieves were evidently frightened away before gaining admittance.

In 1916 White was secretary of the Davenport Rotary Club. In June 1917 White took part in the special assembly on club publications at the Eighth Annual Convention of the International Association of Rotary Clubs and delivered a talk on “The Work of Making the City Beautiful” – about a competition the Rotarians had been running for yards and vegetable gardens in Davenport. He also represented Davenport at the 1923 Convention.

W. R. White, Providence, R.I., USA

W. R. White, Providence R.I.

W. R. White, Providence, published private mailing cards in the undivided era both on his own and with A E Warner.

From 1884 until at least the first decade of the 20th century White & Warner of Hartford, Connecticut published The Street Railway Journal including, in 1903, a card illustrating the right and wrong ways of getting off trolley cars.

Messrs. Warner and White have compiled and published a very interesting little booklet called Trips by Trolly and A-Wheel Around Hartford. It is copiously illustrated from photographs, of special artistic merits, one of which, through the courtesy of the publishers, we are enabled to reproduce. The little book sells for ten cents, and it can be found on all news-stands. The varied and interesting information, and the maps it contains, make it really worth several times the price.
The Church Review July 1899

In 1902 they published Trolley Trips Through Southern New England illustrated by photographs by H O Warner. Hartford is about 80 miles from Providence.

this card was produced by Bosselman for White

Carl Wiechmann

Goslar, Lower Saxony, Germany

VW monogram logo of intertwined initials in circle above a four-digit number
NORDWESTDEUTSCHER KUNSTVERLAG GMBH, GOSLAR^³⁹

Carl Hermann Adolf Wiechmann^⁴⁰(1867 to 1932) Munich published a number of fine images of cultural ikons including Goethe and Beethoven, initially with the company name Nordwestdeutscher Kunstverlag and later under his own name from Munich^⁴¹. With his VW monogram he published illustrations by A Mailick (qv). He also published books including his Hiking in the Harz Mountains and Forests and Mountains^⁴².

Manuel Wielandt

Manuel Wielandt

Manuel Wielandt, (1863 to 1922), postcard artist born in Lowenstein, Germany. Wielandt didn’t intend to be a postcard artist, but for more than a decade after his formal studies, he travelled the Continent and used his time and talents to make beautiful pictures in the eternal cities where European heritage and culture made their priceless contributions to Western civilization^⁴³. Wielandt worked primarily in Southern Europe, Switzerland and Germany. His favourite places included the French and Italian Rivieras and the cities in the Italian Veneto region. Wielandt’s cards were published by J. Velten of Karlsruhe (qv) and printed by Ernest Nister of Nurnburg (qv). There are 106 Wielandt postcards – four sets of 25 and one set of six:

Series #	Inclusive Numbers	General Area Covered
Series 1.	201-225	The Liguria Region of Italy
Series 2.	376-400	Italian Lake District and Switzerland
Series 3.	451-475	French Riviera and Provence
Series 4.	526-550	The Veneto Region of Italy

Wiele & Klein, Chennai, India

Publishers Wiele & Klein, Madras

The Nilgiris district is one of the 38 districts in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Nilgiri (English: Blue Mountains) is the name given to a range of mountains spread across the borders among the states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala.

Wiele & Klein, photo studio and publishers, Madras was founded in 1882 and became the most famous photographic studio in the South of India^⁴⁴, Photographers and artists by Appointment to His Excellency The Governor of Madras. In the 19th Century, Wiele & Klein started to produce a set of stereographs, which were coined Veritagrammes. The set is called Indian Series. Some of the major events of history in India were photographed by Wiele & Klein including the Coronation Durbar in Delhi to commemorate the Coronation of Edward VII. The ceremonies in Delhi lasted from 29 December 1902 to 7 January 1903 and were extensively photographed by Wiele & Klein. The photographic coverage resulted in a large, luxurious album with actual photographs, a book with more than two hundred lithographed photographs and titled Coronation Durbar Delhi 1903, and a set of picture postcards. Around 1904 – in any case before the introduction of the divided back on picture postcards – Wiele & Klein produced their largest and probably most successful set of picture postcards with their own photographs. Each card is numbered and most of them are in landscape format. The printing of the title is in deep red. The title is followed by the order number with the name of the publisher. Most Wiele & Klein cards were Madras regional topographical and ethnographic. They sold the right to publish their prints to other companies, such as the Bombay-based firm A.J. Combridge & Co. By 1904, the albumen paper used by the studio since its foundation was completely replaced by silver gelatine paper of glossy finish. In 1908, E.F.H. Wiele established his own studio in Bangalore, trading as Wiele’s Studio, Bangalore and replacing Printed in Saxony with Printed in Germany^⁴⁵.

Leopold Wiesinger

Gmunden, Austria

VERLAG L. WIESINGER, GMUNDEN

Leopold Wiesinger, Gmunden, published local topographicals well into the divided-back era. Wiesinger seems to have bought the business from O. Schleich. Nachfolger. Gmunden is a town in Upper Austria much frequented as a health and summer resort and an important centre of the salt industry.

Wildt & Kray Limited, London

W & K. London, E.C.

Wildt & Kray Limited, fine art printers and publishers, 15 Lensden Place, London EC1. Adolph Ernst Wildt and Henry Joseph Kray (15 September 1866 to 1931) were the principals. Kray was born in Whitechapel, London. Cartoonist Reg Carter left school at 14 to work as a junior clerk in a Southwold solicitor’s office. Postcards he penned in his spare time helped to launch the publishing house in 1904.

The company produced a wide variety of photographic postcards and greetings cards, including scenic views, farm animals and art reproductions such as their ‘Constable’s Country’ series. The hallmark of their cards seems to have been various designs of W&K logos between the words Post and Card though some cards had the full name. Their cards were numbered in a straightforward sequence, 1,000 by about 1907, 2,000 by 1910 and 3,000 by 1913.

Wildt & Kray, designs were highly influential in establishing the ultimate design pattern for the genre of Hands across the Sea cards that exploited the widespread emigration of the era. They produced their first clasped-hands cards in 1906.

Their advertisement for the 1922 British Industries Fair in London, when they were at 116/120 Golden Lane, London, EC1 described them as Colour Printers, Photographic Printers, Gelatiners, Die Stampers, Etc. Christmas, Birthday, Easter Cards; Christmas Stationery; Autograph Boxes; Cabinets of Pictorial and Local View Post Cards; Photographic Post Cards. Zoological Post Cards from Official Photographs – 1st Series, 36 Designs, Just Issued. Post Cards Reproduced in Glossy Bromide from Customers own Photographs.

W&K had two stands at the 1929 British Industries Fair which was also held at White City in London. They were then publishers of the “W and K” series of Christmas, Birthday, Easter Cards, Christmas Stationery, Autograph Boxes, Cabinets, Calendars, Pictorial, Comic, Local View and Photographic Post Cards. Photographic and Colour Printers. Wildt & Kray also published as postcards real photographs they took of Wembley Stadium for the British Empire Exhibition, Wembley, in 1924 to 25.

A liquidator was appointed on 23 July 1952 and the company voluntarily wound up. Kray, distantly related to the notorious gangland twins, had died in 1931 in Edmonton, Essex with £19,000 in his estate.

Sources: Picture Postcards and their Publishers Anthony Byatt 1978 Golden Age Postcard Books pages 330-331; Richard Edmunds; Hands across the Sea Peter Gilderdale 2013

J. D. Williams Bro. & Co.

Scranton, PA, USA

J. D. Williams Bro. & Co., Scranton, Pa.

J. D. Williams Bro. & Company, 314 Lackawanna Avenue, Scranton, Pa. In 1892 Williams were manufacturers, jobbers and retailers of Ice Cream, Confectionery, Toys & Nuts also Bicycles, Velocipedes, Tricycles and Wagons. They were special agents for Victor, Credenda and Gendron bicycles.

Williams’ stores included dining rooms that were featured in a series of important buildings of Scranton published by Tucks in 1905. Their Toyland (Joyland) department was on the second floor at 111 to 117 Washington Avenue. On 9 November 1906 fire destroyed the Williams store at Washington Avenue. Williams published a card featuring the interior of the first floor after the fire.

In 1913 JD Williams were selling layer cakes for 25 cents. In 1920 the store at Lackawanna Avenue listed Dining Room, Bakery, Soda Fountain and Candy.

Source: Tucks DB; PA News Archive

This card: This is the new building of the Scranton 1st Presbyterian Church on the corner of Madison Avenue and Olive Street dedicated in 1904. Source: 1st Presbyterian Church

Joseph Williamson

Paterson, New Jersey, USA

J. Williamson, 132 Market St., Paterson, N.J.

Filtering Plant, East Jersey Co, Little Falls, New Jersey. In 1902, the East Jersey Water Company constructed the world’s first large rapid sand filter system at Little Falls.

Joseph Williamson, stationer, 132 Market St., Paterson, published local topographicals into the divided-back era.

Williamson delivered the morning metropolitan papers and the evening press throughout the city from his stationery store at 13 Park Avenue where he still was in 1894. On 22 December 1890 Williamson employed nine carriers to deliver the first edition of the Evening News newspaper.

On 2 May 1899 the local News paper reported that Joseph Williamson had instituted an action against Dr C. Eugene MacChesney for damages, on the ground that the Doctor made fraudulent representations to him as to the education of son. and that he paid large sums of money for education at the MacChesney business college, Mr. Williamson alleged that the agreement was that his son was to be made a first class bookkeeper. All the time the son was at the business college Mr. Williamson said that he received flattering reports of his progress and was led to believe that the boy was doing fine. Recently the lad attempted to enter the commercial course at the High school but failed to pass the examination. This angered his father who demanded an explanation. The paper quoted a lengthy explanation from the defender:

I was compelled to take legal proceedings to force Mr Williamson to settle his bill. The present suit is the result. More attention was given to his son than to any other single student… The young man was usually late, would be absent a portion of the day, and when detained to make up his work would absent himself on the following day. Mr. Williamson was informed promptly by mail…. Everything was done for him that could be done. It is simply a case of a boy being petted at home and no support given to the instructor. I see no reason why the public should be interested in anything of this kind. I have done much more than I agreed to do… More depends upon the student than upon the school. Yon can take a horse to water, you cannot make him drink.

The Williston Press

Boston, Massachusetts, USA

“THE WILLISTON PRESS” BOSTON.

The Williston Press, 47 Franklin Street, Boston were printers founded 1834 possibly as successors to Beard and Williston who published the Middlesex Telegraph, and Manufacturers’ and Farmers’ Advocate between September 1831 and 1832. On 22 April 1893 the Boston Globe reported a fire that had started that morning in ceiling of the fourth storey of the five-storey building at the corner of Hawley and Franklin Streets where 47 Franklin was occupied by the Williston Press. Williston published books between at least 1891 and 1930. My photocard of kittens is printed in brown on both sides.

George Washington Wilson

G W W series
G.W.W. in diamond logo between POST and CARD
THE G.W.W. SERIES

George Washington Wilson (1823 to 1893), born in the north east of Scotland, went to Edinburgh and then London in the 1840s to train as a portrait miniaturist. He became established in Aberdeen in the 1850s as an artist and photographer, and quickly made a name for himself among the middle classes and landed gentry. His patronage by the Royal Family during their visits to the Balmoral Estates began in 1854 when he was invited to take photographs of them in the grounds of Balmoral. He received the official appointment of Photographer Royal for Scotland in 1860 and his relationship with the Royal family continued throughout his career. Wilson’s success allowed him to employ staff photographers to carry out the routine portraiture business whilst he travelled the country indulging in his new interest in landscape photography. Wilson won a number of prizes for his photographic works including medals at the Great London International Exhibition of 1862 for his experimentation in quick exposures. George Washington Wilson and Co. captured images from all over Britain, recording everything from the natural grandeur of Fingal’s Cave on the Isle of Staffa to the bustle of London’s Oxford Street. Wilson’s staff of photographers included his son, Charles Wilson who, with senior staff photographer Fred Hardie, toured the colonial townships of South Africa. Dispatched to capture images of Australia in 1892, Hardie also travelled through Queensland, Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide. These tours provide a vivid picture of gold miners and early settlers at work and play, and of the native or aboriginal way of life. The company invested in independent photographers to capture the western Mediterranean, where they took images of Gibraltar and the south of Spain, Morocco and Tangiers.

Throughout, Wilson demonstrated technical and commercial acumen, and, by the early 1880s, the company he founded had become the largest and best-known photographic and printing firm in Scotland. Wilson handed the business over to his sons, Charles, Louis and John Wilson in 1888. The 2023 edition of the Picture Postcard Annual records the earliest posting of a GWW card on 12 June 1901.

The company only survived for a short time under the management of his sons, with much of the company being sold in 1905 and finally ceasing trading in 1908 when the company stock was auctioned off⁴⁶.

This card: Michael Bruce (27 March 1746 to 15 July 1767) was a Scottish poet and hymnist. Bruce was born at Kinnesswood in the parish of Portmoak, Kinross-shire, Scotland.

Winkler & Schorn

Nuremberg, Germany

WINKLER & SCHORN, NÜRNBERG
WINKLER & SCHORN, NÜRNBERG MEISTERBILDER SERIE II Woolstone Bros. Milton serie 478 Milton logo
SOUVERAIN S. XXIV

Albrecht Durer logo

Michael Winkler (born in 1790 in Reichenau / Freystadt in Austria) commodities merchant in the spice trade. Winkler established a shop in Nuremberg in 1817. In 1827, after Winkler’s death, Emanuel Anton von Schorn, (born 1880 in Nuremberg), who had been a representative of the company, adopted his 16-year-old son and married his widow, becoming a shareholder of the company, which became Winkler & Schorn. Von Schorn was wealthy at that time, and a liveried servant accompanied him on his daily rides. By 1840 Winkler & Schorn, were established as a paper store in Albrecht-Dürersplatz. Some of their cards bear the name of Dürer, the painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance under a statue of the great man. By 1900 Winkler & Schorn were printing postcards including the flood of 1908^⁴⁷. They overprinted their sunshine series^⁴⁸ and other cards with the name and Milton logo of Woolstone Bros (qv). Their series trademarked SOUVERAIN were Gruss Aus and other artist-drawn topographicals numbered in Roman numerals represented in capital letters. They are still in the paper and plastic business in Rosstal^⁴⁹.

Nuremberg’s most famous son, the painter Albrecht Dürer is buried in the Johannisfriedhof where it attracts locals, art lovers and tourists alike.

Sources: „Hier ruhe, Künstlerfürst“: Dürers Grab auf dem Johannisfriedhof; Advertentie Winkler & Schorn, Nürnberg Vereniging Documentatie Prentbriefkaarten

Winkler & Voigt, Leipzig, Germany

KUNSTVERLAG, WINKLER & VOIGT, LEIPZIG

In the address book for Leipzig 1949^⁵⁰ the company was listed at 8 Gerichtsweg trading in wholesale in paper, writing and leather goods and as a greeting cards publisher. They published lithograph postcards in the Gruss aus model in Paris, the Italian Lakes and Compliments from London in the British market and of the work of local Leipzig artist Erwin Spindler(qv).

This card: Georg Heuer of Dresden sent this card in January 1902. Heinrich Gläser started business as a saddler and harness maker in 1864 and in a short time was saddle-maker for the Royal Court of Saxon and a coach maker for the elite of Dresden. By 1890 he employed more than 100 people and his daughter was married to Emil Heuer, a successful master blacksmith from Radeberg. Their businesses were merged under that name and their staff increased to 175.

Emiel Heuer got into the automobile business when a local dealer asked him to build a new body on his old chassis and Heuer liked it so much that he started to build bodywork. Of Heuer’s three sons Georg liked his father’s work the most. Together they expanded the company into a workforce of 250 employees in the mid-1920s. In 1931 the design of Georg Heuer’s new convertible was voted the best of the best in Europe, and the authoritative magazine the British Motor called the 1932 convertible one of the most beautiful cabriolets ever built.

But the demands of automation of car building prompted them to borrow a lot of money for the refurbishment of his factory. An anticipated order from Chevrolet failed to materialise and the company was declared bankrupt overnight in 1932. Georg Heuer committed suicide.

Source: EARLY CAR BODY BUILDERS

Albert Winzenberg

Masterton, Wairarapa, New Zealand

McL. & Y. Academy Series. Photo by Winzenberg

Early in the 20th century Tasmanian-born Albert Winzenberg was Masterton’s leading photographer, with a studio in Queen Street. His output was prolific, and he took some of it from the 729 metre hill near the end of Mt Holdsworth Road that now bears his name. Winzenberg Hill commands panoramic views of the eastern Tararuas and Wairarapa valley. When Winzenberg arrived in Wairarapa the hill was covered in dense bush, but during the exceptionally dry summer of 1907-08 a fire in the Waingawa valley got away and swept over the ridge to the Atiwhakatu. Winzenberg also did studio portraits.

Source: South Wairarapa Tramping Club

Walter Wirth, New York

BL. BY VALTER WIRTHS ART CO. N. Y.
Published by Walter Wirth, New York

Walter Wirth, New York, published good quality series of cards that made up complete illustrations when placed next to each other. Many others were much less impressive cartoons on brown paper. They also produced view cards of Philadelphia focussing on the De Long Hook and Eye Company and their advertising logo See that hump?. Some of their undivided-backs were printed in Scotland. In the Annual Reports Of The New York State Treasurer For The Fiscal Years Ending 30 September 1905 and 1906, Walter Wirth’s Art Co was shown as having paid state corporation tax of $5 in 1905^⁵¹.

H. Woldag

Bad Harzburg, Lower Saxony, Germany

H. Woldag, Bad Harzburg.

Woldag took over C R Stolle’s bookshop in Bad Harzburg. Bad Harzburg lies on the northern edge of the Harz mountains and is a recognised saltwater spa and climatic health resort. In 1890 he published Legends of Harzburg and the surrounding area by Marie Eichler. In the 1890s he published local topographical photographs in the carte de cabinet format and, before the turn of the century, Gruss aus postcards. In 1898 he published Werner Glanz’s book commemorating Twenty-five years of operation for Halberstadt-Blankenburg Railway. He wrote and published The latest guide to Bad Harzburg and the surrounding area, along with a signpost through the Okerthal with a map of the town and promenade. In 1914 Woldag was listed as a bookshop selling antique and guide books.

H L Woehler, Buffalo, New York

H. L. Woehler, Buffalo, N. Y. & Dresden, Germany logo of Indian headdress and H L W. B NY in artist’s easel

H. L Woehler, Buffalo, New York publishers of Christmas and picture post cards. Their topographical photo-cards extended across the US. Woehler captioned a divided-back of the Temple of Music at the Pan American Exposition, Buffalo, NY: where President McKinlay was shot September 6^th1901. Their divided backs were often headed Woehler’s Hand Colored Post Cards.

George A. Wolf

Wilmington, Delaware, USA

GEO. A. WOLF, WILMINGTON, DEL
GEORGE A. WOLF, WILMINGTON, DEL

George Aloys Wolf (1862 to 1946) printer and publisher, Wilmington, Delaware. New Jersey – born Wolf moved to Wilmington sometime around 1890 and married there a year later. By at least 1893, Wolf had set up shop in the Equitable Building at Ninth and Market Streets. Wolf advertised Designing, Illustrating, Engraving, and urged businesses to use woodcuts in their advertisements. Wolf printed advertisements, calendars, postcards and a number of books mostly local histories and travel guide-type books, that would have lots of illustrations and pictures in them – classic postcard publisher fare. Most lastingly, perhaps, Wolf also designed the DuPont Oval logo. He also printed the illustrated trade catalogue made to showcase Robin Hood bicycles, another Wilmington business^⁵². By 1910, Wolf had moved out of the city and appears to have left the printing business in 1911 when he leased his printing plant to Harrison W. Barnes. His occupation in the 1920 census had changed to farmer from publisher as it had been^⁵³.

This card: In the 1920s the Young Men’s Christian Association located at the northeast corner of 10th and Orange Streets ran a programme of physical fitness in the public schools as a voluntary community service. C Walter Kadel, a director of the Physical Education Department of the Y, gave classes in calisthenics, physical exercise in health, strength and grace, at No. 24 school. Source: The Morning News, Wilmington, 9 May 1979

Hermann Wolff, Berlin

Hermann Wolff, seems to have been a fancy paper wholesaler by 1888 and to have added speciality greeting cards by 1894. Many of the postcards bearing the initials associated with him are greetings cards.

By the turn of the century the company name featured in bold in address books. In 1901 HWB was owned by Hermann and Alfred Wolff and William Wolff joined the next year.

In the divided-back era, Wolff published cards with HWiB in the outline of a wolf as well as a more stylised HWB. In WWI, when he was at 7 Boppstrasse, S59, Wolff printed and published cards numbered with a K prefix.

Hermann Wolff & Co. was converted into a G.m.b.H. (Limited company) in 1922, soon to become a 100% subsidiary of EAS, E. A. Schwerdtfeger & Co. A.G., a huge printing/publishing company.

As Helmfried Luers observes in The Postcard Album 27, there is no shortage of Hermann Wolffs with which to confuse this publisher.

Sources: The Postcard Album 27

Wolfrum & Hauptmann, Nuremberg, Bavaria, Germany

DRUCK v WOLFRUM & HAUPTMANN

Wolfrum & Hauptmann, lithographers and printers, Nürnberg produced cards demonstrating a variety of printing techniques. These included Wolfrum & Hauptmann’s Price Fan Postcard Series embossed chromo-lithographs.

In the Czech journal Free Directions^⁵⁴ in 1899 the Wolfram & Hauptmann Lithographic Art Institute in Nuremberg announced a public tender for the acquisition of posters for various industries. Prices are set at 1000, 500 and 200 marks. Delivery deadline March 15, 1899. For more detailed information, contact the Bayerische Gewerbemuseum^⁵⁵ in Nuremberg.

In 1902 the company produced the official postcards for the German Fleet Review at Darmstadt including a series featuring individual vessels. The firm is listed in The Trade Contracts of 1903: Reflections and Proposals^⁵⁶in the members directory of the Trade Association of the Art Printing Industry.

This card: The Gänsemännchenbrunnen is one of the oldest fountains in the city of Nuremberg . The fountain is located north of Nuremberg’s main market in the St. Sebald district . The name Gänsemännchen refers to the bronze cast fountain figure, which depicts a farmer with two geese under his arm.

Wood, Los Angeles, California, USA

“WOOD’S” POSTCARDS, LOS ANGELES

Wood’s, published San Francisco earthquake and fire, April 18, 1906: Scenes Before, During and After in 1906 with the banner on the cover: California always on top Now records the most stupendous fire in history. They also published cards of the pictures in this souvenir book. When they merged with rival postcard firm L. R. Severn of Los Angeles, they appear to have been described as Wood Publishers of Los Angeles and Leipzig^⁵⁷.

George Woolley

Ludlow, Shropshire, England

Woolley, Ludlow
WOOLLEY, PRINTER, LUDLOW

George Woolley (1837 to 4 October 1914) was a printer and bookseller in Ludlow. In 1888 he published Ludlow, Town and Neighbourhood. A Series of Sketches of its Scenery, Antiquities, Geology, drawn and described in Pen and Ink By Oliver Baker^⁵⁸. In 1893 he wrote and published The Parish Church of St Lawrence, Ludlow; A monograph of the tower restoration 1889-90-91^⁵⁹. By 1905, Woolley’s Ludlow Guide (Woolley’s Historical and Descriptive Sketch of Ludlow Castle and the Church of St Lawrence Ludlow) was in its 12^th edition^⁶⁰ and a further edition was published in 1909. George Woolley Limited is recorded as struck from the register of companies in The London Gazette of 24 February 1911. Woolley earned enough to have a servant and died leaving £5,632 3s 9d. He was one of the first to be buried in Ludlow Cemetery at Henley Road^⁶¹.

The card describing him as PRINTER is also in FRITH’S SERIES. Possibly Firth sold the photograph to Woolley for him to make his own postcard.

Woolstone Brothers, London

Woolstone Bros. Milton Series
WOOLSTONE BROTHERS, THE MILTON SERIES, LONDON, E.C. THE MILTON POST CARD TRADE MARK above and MILTON below a portait of the poet
The Milton Series No. 301 Woolstone Bros, London E.C.

In 1902 Gustave Woolstone, who was of Silesian origin, registered the trade name Milton, no doubt because the business’s first premises were in Milton Street in London. They remained there, trading as Woolstone Brothers, until WWI. Their earliest cards had undivided backs and were printed by Winkler & Schorn, Nurnberg (qv) overprinted with the name and Milton logo of Woolstone Bros^⁶². These included the 1903 sunshine series^⁶³ where the principal subject was accentuated by an embossed gilt dot. Woolstone was present at the Peace Banquet held by the Jewish Historical Society in 1920 to celebrate the peace and the semi-jubilee of the society.

World Post Card Company, Philadelphia, PA, USA

THE WORLD POST CARD CO., 1008 WALNUT ST., PHILADELPHIA

World Post Card Company, Philadelphia, a publisher and printer of black & white and tinted halftone view-cards in line block. The company was founded in 1903 by J. Murray Jordan who also produced postcards under his own name^⁶⁴.

This is only one half or less of a panoramic card.

W. Wörmbcke

Düsseldorf, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany

Verlag W. Wörmbcke (Inh. Wörmbcke & Betcke), Düsseldorf

Wörmbcke & Schütze existed before either of the formulations on my card.
In 1897 they published Pictures from old and new Düsseldorf By Wilhelm Schreuer. In 1898 they were publishing humorous cards and images of Dusseldorf by local artist Ernst Tannert (1866 to 1915). They also published Eckstein’s portrait of Emil Zola, a major figure in the political liberalization of France and, particularly, the Dreyfus affair, a political scandal that divided the Third French Republic from 1894 until its resolution in 1906. Zola’s role in the exoneration of the falsely-accused and convicted army officer Alfred Dreyfus is encapsulated in the renowned newspaper headline of January 1898: J’Accuse…! In 1900 they published work by Hermann Zivi (19. May 1867 to 13 January 1943) German cantor and composer.

Later the partnership of Wörmbcke & Richard Betcke were behind the Düsseldorf bookshop and publishing house of W. Wörmbcke. They published local topographical photocards into the divided-back era. In 1913 they produced The struggle of women. A speech for the Düsseldorf local group of the Women’s Suffrage Association for West Germany.

Schütze + Wörmbcke’s bookshop was still going in Dusseldorf in 1972.

John Evelyn Wrench, London

The Wrench Series
The Wrench Series with a drawing of a wrench and WRENCH in an oval logo
Wrench, John, and Son, 50, Gray’s Inn Road, London, W.C.

John Evelyn Wrench (1882 to 1966)^⁶⁶ was only 18 when, in 1900, he published his first card. The earliest postmark on one of his cards is dated 26 March 1901 in the 2023 edition of the Picture Postcard Annual. By 1904 his business had stock covering more than ten thousand subjects and had issued a similar number of stands to retailers. Financial crisis led Wrench to leave the business which, after destroying two million cards considered substandard, closed in 1906. Unusually for a postcard publisher, Wrench wrote an autobiography, Uphill The first stage in a strenuous life. My card of a tinted photograph of a Yeoman of the Guard has a postmark-type stamp below the picture commemorative of the Coronation of King Edward VII in 1902, a promotional exercise by the publisher it seems. Series 2574 featured cartoons from Punch and, on the address side, a reproduction of the cover of that journal.

George E Wright

Hartford, Connecticut, USA

GEORGE E. WRIGHT, HARTFORD, CONN

George E Wright, (1853 to 1926) Hartford. Wright was a pioneering postcard publisher/photographer who published local topographical photographs as Private Mailing Cards^⁵² and into the divided-back era. His early cards included Wright’s panoramic view of Hartford, a series of views of the city and a Thanksgiving card of a turkey in monochrome artwork. His postcards of Hartford public buildings, parks, bridges, stores, streets and churches are collectors’ items. In 1902 he wrote the 36 page Hartford Connecticut Street List and Rapid Transit Guide, fares, streetcar lines, street directory, how to get anywhere. In 1908 he wrote and published Crossing the Connecticut, a memorial to the then new Hartford Bridge, which is still in use today and is one of the oldest bridges in the interstate highway system. It is also the largest stone arch bridge in the world. The book also documents all the bridges and ferries that existed at that site and all the public crossing places on the Connecticut river within the state of Connecticut^⁵³.

This card: The oldest surviving Catholic church building in Hartford, the Portland brownstone Gothic Revival St. Peter’s Church, was completed in 1868. It was designed by James Murphy, who had once been an associate of Patrick Keely. The parish was established nine years earlier, in 1859, and served the city’s growing Irish-American population. This otherwise unimpressive photograph shows it before towers were added in the 1920s.

Karl F Wunder

Hanover, Germany

Phot. u. Verlag Karl F Wunder, Hannover. Lichtdruck v. Knackstedt & Nather, Hamburg

Karl Friedrich Wunder, (born 1849) photographer, Hanover, was taught photography by his father Friedrich Karl Wunder who started business in 1844 and became the best known Hanoverian photographer of the 19th century. In 1875 Wunder took over the father’s business, advertising portraits, architecture and landscapes. When he took part in the 1878, general trade exhibition of the province of Hanover, the official trade exhibition newspaper said of his work: It is mostly portraits of famous personalities of Hanover in impeccable execution. Position, exposure and retouching leave nothing to be desired – still enhanced by the elegant frames from the Siegmund Federlein factory.

About then he had the Wunder-Haus built by the architect Christoph Hehl as his place of residence and business on Friedrichstrasse (today 17 Friedrichswall). The red brick building in Gothic style was the first bourgeois, four-story building in the section of the street that was previously dominated by aristocratic palace buildings. The building was destroyed by air raids in WWII though the facade remains as a listed building. At the beginning of the 1880s, Wunder sat on the board of the German Photographic Association, the first all-Germany interest group for those professionally involved in photography. At the latest after the introduction of the telephone in Hanover in 1887 Wunder had a branch in Leipzig in association with Georg Brokesch.

Wunder produced numbered and un-numbered local topographical cards. This example is his own photograph of Hannover printed by Knackstedt & Naether. The business did not survive the economic difficulties of the inter-war years.

Würthle & Son, Salzburg, Austria

WÜRTHLE & SOHN, SALZBURG

Karl Friedrich Würthle^⁶⁵(18 September 1820 to 8 October 1902) was a photographer in Salzburg. In partnership with Hermann Spinnhirn he began the production and distribution of postcards and gained world fame for their landscapes, especially high mountains. They opened a chromolithograph facility in Freilassing in Bavaria. There followed retail operations in Munich, Vienna and London. Würthle’s son Friedrich took over Spinnhirn’s interest after his death in 1892 and the company was renamed Würthle und Sohn. But the height of success was over, and as early as 1904 Friedrich Würthle junior had to sell his studio on Schwarzstrasse to the photographers Eduard Bertel and Carl Pietzner. Publishing ceased in 1907. See also Josef Kasseroller.

This Austrian card was posted in Berchesgaden with a 10 pfennig Bavarian postage stamp and travelled via Paris to Tarn in southern France. The castle of Kerlo dominates the village of Lacabarède. It was built in the 1850s by wealthy landowners in the purest style of the *Belle Epoque*. Long neglected, it was bought in the late 1990s by a Dutch couple who restored it.

Wyndham & Company

Acton, Middlesex, England

The “Wyndham” Series

This card is in the style of card issued by Wyndham

Wyndham & Company of Acton are said to have manufactured over 10,000 different cards from 1902 onwards^⁶⁸though undivided back cards clearly indicates earlier activity of this kind. Their Wyndham series included many views of England, particularly London and a social history series London Life. Wyndham & Co., Ltd., Bollo Lane, Acton. W. printed the Reports of the Chief Librarian for the Metropolitan Borough of Hammersmith for the years ended 31st March, 1907 to 1909^⁶⁹. Maides’ Stores, Stationer, bookseller and newsagent, West Street, Midhurst, Sussex, published their own postcards and bought from others including Wyndham & Co. who anonymously made collotypes that have serial numbers prefaced by the letter W. The Wyndham Series also included 40 Views of Hastings, St Leonards, Bexhill, Battle Abbey and Neighbourhood^⁷⁰

Lawrence of Dublin used the same design of back albeit sometimes in green.

particularly the stylised capitals on Post Card

19 https://www.foto-ch.ch/?a=fotograph&id=20943&lang=de

20 Gebrüder Wehrli. Pioniere der Alpin-Fotografie (FotoSzeneSchweiz) Gebundene Ausgabe – 1. Mai 2005 – Gebrüder Wehrli. Pioneers of alpine photography Edited by Paul Hugger / With texts by Johannes Vogel PhotoSceneSwitzerland 1st ed., May 2005;

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21 http://www.limmatverlag.ch/programm/titel/283-gebrueder-wehrli-pioniere-der-alpin-fotografie.html

22 http://www.photoglob.ch/about-me/

23 http://www.vosgesmatin.fr/edition-de-saint-die/2016/01/12/l-histoire-militaire-au-fil-des-cartes-postales

35 The Brooklyn Daily Eagle 31 May 1918

36 Daily News 12 September 1922

37 http://www.exetermemories.co.uk/em/wheatons.php

38firmenemblem

39 Northwest German art publishing house – Goslar am Harz

40 http://www.tpa-project.info/html/body_logo_gallery.html

41 http://www.goethezeitportal.de/wissen/musik/beethoven-auf-alten-postkarten.html

42 http://www.worldcat.org/title/walder-und-berge/oclc/8951342