Now Reading: Postcards show 1900s New Jersey coastal life before development
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Postcards show 1900s New Jersey coastal life before development
A collection of vintage postcards donated to the National Park Service reveals details of early 20th-century life on New Jersey's Sandy Hook peninsula. The 24 colour postcards, part of Paul Koeptchem's estate,…
The Story in Brief
A collection of vintage postcards donated to the National Park Service reveals details of early 20th-century life on New Jersey's Sandy Hook peninsula. The 24 colour postcards, part of Paul Koeptchem's estate, were donated in 1975. The Times of India reports that oral histories by NPS historians accompany the collection.
Retired Lieutenant Colonel John Mulhern, who lived on Sandy Hook from 1908 to 1927, recalled in the interviews how marine observers tracked ships by silhouettes before electronic systems, how the Twin Lights of Navesink operated with a manually wound lens, and how ice was cut from ponds for sale. The postcards show open fields and ponds replaced by homes and roads.
The Indian Opinion
The usual American nostalgia piece paints this as a simple lost paradise. But the real story is about technological change displacing manual skill. Ship spotters with 3×5 cards, lighthouse keepers winding heavy weights, these were jobs erased by radar and Loran. Property owners who lost land to eminent domain in 1962 got compensation, not sentiment. The question for a reader is: when today's gadgets become obsolete, what will our grandchildren say we did by hand that they can't imagine?
Source: timesofindia.indiatimes.com
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