These cards are actually counterfeits of a card by Lance Thackery for
Raphael Tuck,
with the exception of the large one. In the heyday of postcards unscrupulous publishers,
in
this case Morris Post Card Co. of Philadelphia, would often steal images from
popular
cards. Some of these cards are numbered 37 and some 371 in the lower
left
front corner.
While Thackery signed his card and executed a lovely, colorful watercolor,
the Morris cards can be identified by the crudeness of the copy, the lack of signature,
the heavy toning of the paper, and the cheap lithography. They use only a few colors
and those are
applied without much care. I was able to identify them as Morris cards
by their “postcard” script on the back.
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