Travel
A Windy Day at the Flatiron Building: Greeting from New York. NY: Gem Patent Novelty Co., 1906.
This postcard is presumably part of the Souvenir Mail Card series. The “waterfall” mechanic makes five double-sided photo images of New York City landmarks flip over one by one when pulling the tab: Brooklyn Bridge, Columbia College Library, New York Clearing House, Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Bowery, Broadway south of St. Paul’s Church, Sixth Avenue at 23rd Street, Trinity Church, Soldiers and Sailors Monument, and the New York skyline from the North [Hudson] River. Treasured souvenirs preserve memories and ensure that they will be kept.
Fair Faces: 4 Pieces Make 256 Pictures. St. Louis, MO: American Folding Box Co., 1939.
This challenging cardboard mix-and-match game, produced for the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition in San Francisco, CA, asks you to make a specific face by removing and turning each of the four removable square pieces and then reinserting them back into the board. The reverse is ringed with images of sixteen people, including four presidents, that the user can create. The challenge is to re-create the faces by turning the four pieces until the image is complete. World’s Fair souvenirs are a great source of collectible movable ephemera and serve as historical keepsakes.
Central Lenin Stadium. Moscow, Russia, [ca. 1960].
A souvenir diorama card with acetate window of the Grand Arena of the Central Lenin Stadium built in Moscow in 1955–56. It is now known as the Luzhniki Stadium.
Pic-A-Pop-Up Card: Statue of Liberty. NY: Jenneal International Corp., 1967.
Opening the flap closure of the postcard sideways causes Miss Liberty in New York harbor to pop up vertically. The statue’s history is printed in detail below it. This postcard is one of a series highlighting New York and London landmarks.
Flying is fun with Gulf Air. Kingdom of Bahrain: Gulf Public Relations, [ca. 1960s].
The story of a Middle Eastern boy’s flight to London is printed in this pop-up book by the celebrated paper engineer, Ib Penick, with several mechanicals. The movable book promotes travel via Gulf Air.
Introduces the Incredible 747. NY: Pan Am Airlines, [ca. 1970].
This matchbook highlights Pan Am’s newest airplane in its fleet with a pop-up 747. While saving matchbook covers is a subject of collecting in and of itself, adding a pop-up inside one almost guarantees it will be saved long after the matches have been used up. Alas, Pan Am declared bankruptcy in 1991.
Last year, where did 37 million people come to play? Next year, where will millions more come to conduct business? Atlantic City, NJ: Atlantic City Convention & Visitors Authority, 1997.
A pop-up of Atlantic City’s visitor highlights between paper-covered boards, followed by the attributes of doing business and staying in Atlantic City. Produced for the re-opening of the city’s Convention Center. Trump Plaza, now demolished, is visible.