(Click on images to enlarge)
I'm guessing maybe this thing was handed out by salesmen calling on prospective clients?
As we know, the Kulage Brick Works operated for about 30 years, starting circa 1892[1] and ending sometime during the 1920s. I previously posted about the brickyard's being indefinitely shut down in 1921, but I don't know if that was the end of it.[2]
The one-cent McKinley postage stamp tells us that the postcard must date to 1902 or later, since a president must be dead for at least a year before appearing on a postage stamp. [7/16/2026 update: the stamp dates to 1907 or later; see the comments to this post.] I have found an Ebay listing for such a postcard with a 1910 postmark; another listing elsewhere dates an unused postcard ca. 1907. But I can't find any information about when this particular stamp stopped being used.[3]
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[1] I previously posted a 1919 article stating that Otto Kulage "purchased the plant about twenty-seven years ago," i.e., 1892.
[2] Notes on the back of some photos at the Hobart Historical Society give the approximate starting and ending dates as 1885 to 1925-26. Per the 1919 article cited above, the brickyard was already operating when Otto Kulage bought it and gave it his name.
[3] A history of postage rates for postcards can be found here.
4 comments:
Technically the McKinley stamp never stopped being used, they're still worth 1cent in postage, and hypothetically if you had 82 of them you could still use them to mail a letter to this day! I work in a post office and have a couple PO Box customers that regularly get mail that uses 60+ year old stamps.
I suppose that applies to all stamps: the stamp itself stays good at its original value, which may not be enough to get the letter delivered when rates go up. But there must have been a time when this McKinley stamp just stopped being printed?
Did a little more research... the McKinley stamp (Scott UX19) is actually a postcard stamp that came pre-printed on the postcards. First issued in 1907, it was used into the early 1920's.
Thank you!
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