The practice of sending private messages through sealed letters was the norm until the mid-19th century. In 1865, the concept of postal cards was first introduced in Germany. However, it was the Austrian government that officially issued the first postal card on October 1, 1869. Despite initial criticism from those who believed it was inappropriate to send messages on cards that could potentially be read by others, including servants, postal cards gained widespread popularity due to their lower postage cost compared to traditional letters.
Sri Lanka in the Crown Colony of Ceylon at the time started issuing its first Postcards a few years later in 1872!
Our Postal department reprinted this iconic card as a souvenir reprint.
Hey, its super interesting! Can you tell why often on the envelope in tv and film have blue red white frames on it? The postcrossing logo is also in these colors, so i think it has a meaning!
Here’s an image of a poster being auctioned next week, an 1898 ad for Dietrich Publications, a company that “commissioned postcards from artists of the highest quality.”
I too found this quite interesting so I went down a fact-finding rabbit hole.
The blue, red, and white frames that you often see on envelopes on TV and film are actually the colors of the United States Postal Service (USPS) logo. These colors are meant to symbolize the American flag and represent the Postal Service’s commitment to serving the country.
As for the Postcrossing logo, the blue, red, and white colors are also used to represent different elements. Blue represents the sky and the vastness of the world, red symbolizes love and passion for traveling, and white represents the blank postcard waiting to be filled with words and images.
