Photographic Postcards

The University of Delaware Library Postcard Collection includes over one hundred fifty photographic, or "Real Photo," postcards — photographs of local businesses, railroad stations, schools, private homes, and landscapes — that document life in Delaware during the early twentieth century. They are ephemera of a distinctly local flavor—visual records of social gatherings, small town celebrations, fairs and markets, and local disasters. Photographic postcards were created in small quantities, often by the amateur photographer, for the consumption of his own small circle of family and friends, rather than being mass-produced by a publisher and sold in retail stores. While many postcards are “stock” images of well-known sights and places, photographic postcards are more likely to be unique images. They capture a moment, preserve a unique view, or reveal the distinctive local character of a place.

Images of the University of Delaware

The University of Delaware Library Postcard Collection contains over seventy images of the University of Delaware's Newark campus. These postcards record not only the appearance of some buildings that are today changed, but they also illustrate a story of two small colleges, Delaware College and its affiliate, the Women’s College.  Their particular development created the campus as it appears today.  With the facilities of Delaware College clustered around the Old College building north of Main Street, and the Women’s College buildings located nearly a mile to the south, the two schools would become one university largely through the negotiation of architecture.  As buildings designed for shared use by both Colleges were built in the area between the two campuses, coeducation gradually replaced single-sex education, and the two schools became the University of Delaware.