Carlton World

[CarltonHendricks]

A CLEVER CASE OF EARLY POWERBOAT RELATED ADVERTISING

Some may know my interest in pre 1920 powerboat racing I’ve taken to over the last few years…tuff to find…especially pre 1910…I was cruising eBay recently and spotted this postcard…great looking early speedboat but I’m not into postcards much…then I looked at the back…postmarked January 8th 1909, 5:30pm Detroit Michigan…signed: “W. E. Scripps”….I vaguely recalled the Scripps name was related to publishing…launched an investigation faster than a Senate Intelligence Committee looking into fake Russian Collusion….Turned out W.E. Scripps was William Edmund Scripps…born May 6, 1882 to James E. Scripps, founder of the “Detroit News” newspaper. The Detroit News started in 1873 and evolved into one of the largest media empires.






So according to the verso, penned in his own hand…it’s a photo of him in the throes of winning the National Long Distance Championship of 1908, which was held in Detroit…the P.S. even provides that the boat was going 29 MPH when the photo was taken…pretty straight forward…But let’s take a more comprehensive look…

QUOTE:
Dear Jack - This is a
hand colored photo of my speed boat “Scripps”
the American long distance champion. Going some eh?
Will see you at the New York show and tell you all about it
Yours, W.E. Scripps

P.S. I have covered a mile
course at the rate of 30.3 miles.
Going over 29 when this was taken –
UNQUOTE

FYI The term “going some” was a slang idiom of the period referencing “a high level of achievement”…

William Edmund Scripps
Birth 6 May 1882 Detroit, Wayne County, Michigan
Death 12 Jun 1952 (aged 70) Lake Orion, Oakland County, Michigan, USA
He worked almost 56 years at the Detroit News which was founded by his father James E. Scripps in 1873. He was head of the Detroit News and president of the Detroit News Publishing Company. He was also president of the Scripps Motor Company, manufacturers of marine gasoline engines. Among his many charities was the gift of his private art collection to the city of Detroit and his home which later became the Saint Mary's Residence for Girls; operated by the Daughters of Divine Charity. Mr. Scripps was an air enthusiast and founder of the Radio station WWJ. In later years he devoted much of his time to his farm Wildwood located in Lake Orion. Courtesy findagrave.com

From the bio above we see that besides being a publishing executive, J.W. Scripps was president of Scripps Motor Company…Scripps Motor Company primarily made marine engines and was in business from 1906 to 1956…Which brings us back to this photo…as you can see…the inscription beneath the boat states:

“SCRIPPS” LONG DISTANCE CHAMPION of AMERICA
SIX CYLINDER 5 ½ X 6 SCRIPPS MOTOR





STARTING TO GET THE PICTURE (PUN INTENDED)
After I learned Scripps owned a marine motors company I started to understand the postcard...that it would have been an advertising vehicle for his company...And winning the long distance title of 1908 would have been very important for his motor company’s status...I speculated the postcard was made for his personal use to promote his company...not available retail…

THE POSTCARD PHENOMENA STARTED 1907
From a little research into postcards I learned that in 1907, Kodak introduced a service called "real photo postcards," which enabled customers to make a postcard from any picture they took. Moreover I learned starting March 1, 1907, the postal service allowed senders, for the first time, to include a message on the backs of postcards…The Long Distance Championship race was held August 22nd 1908, so that would be the day the photo was taken according to the back of the postcard.….and the postcard was postmarked January 8th 1909, less than five months after the photo was taken…So we know the postcard was produced sometime between those two dates…So that means our Scripps postcard was produced at least one year, ten months and seven days after written notes on the backs of postcards became permissible…So it’s pretty early-on in the development of the postcard.

SAME POSTCARD – DIFFERENT ADDRESSEE
What I could not figure out was who was "Wm. B. Wallace the postcard was addressed to in Cheney Kansas....and moreover....who was "Jack" that the note speaks to...I researched William B. Wallace in Cheney Kansas in 1909 but found no reference…..Then I researched to see if Jack was a nick name for William….nope it wasn’t….which certainly seemed odd...And then guess what happened…I found another example of the postcard addressed to an Ellis Atwood in Marion Massachusetts…and guess what…the personalized inscription was identical…

When I got mine I looked it over quickly and all looked fine…The style of the handwriting and verbiage seem so realistic and authentic there was nothing to notice…But after seeing the identical Atwood example obviously the personalized note was machine printed and intended to appear hand written…Nothing nefarious, just a cleaver advertising ploy by Scripps that serves as an example of his business acumen…The invention of the photo postcard being less than two years old Scripps had the foresight to exploit the new phenomena in a very simple grassroots method…Why they are written to “Jack” remains a mystery…

GETS DEEPER
But the rabbit hole still had a way to go…Scripps mentioned “Will see you at the New York show and tell you all about it”….”New York show”…what New York show…Some digging turned up that the New York Boat show was held approximately five weeks after my postcard was postmarked...So the advertising ploy had a shelf life...meaning all these postcards would need to be mailed before the Feb. 1909 New York Boat show...

I dug up newspaper coverage of the show and photos...I figured there was a reasonable chance the Scripps booth might be in one of the photos...bingo...had to look hard but it's way in the back of one of them ...but I found it...see it circled in yellow below....

[CarltonHendricks]

Here are some related images to the Scripps Boat post above

[pedodds]

Great story and killer post card C! I love the history on RPPC's. I always wondered when the "craze" started. Thanks for that!!

I am a little disappointed that you couldn't find and image of Scripps and "Jack" together at the Speed Boat show in NY, however! 🤣🤣

[mrreality68]

Originally Posted by pedodds

Great story and killer post card C! I love the history on RPPC's. I always wondered when the "craze" started. Thanks for that!!

I am a little disappointed that you couldn't find and image of Scripps and "Jack" together at the Speed Boat show in NY, however! 🤣🤣

Agreed +1

and the stories continue to amaze

[ooo-ribay]

As always, your research blows my mind!

[CarltonHendricks]

Couple weeks ago I snagged these twenty-two 1905 issues of Power Boat News off Etsy...$5.00 each!!!!...had twenty two listings....bought um all...still can't believe it...The Lord blessed me...Basically I got the lion’s share of issues from spring thru summer 1905...at the beginning of the sport...The American Power Boat Association was formed on Feb. 1903...and the National Association of Engine and Boat Manufactures was formed in June 1904...so we're talking very early in the evolution...I'm still learning the ropes on early powerboat racing...but I speculate their could not be a more direct source of information on the subject from the period!!!!

[CarltonHendricks]

One of the things I collect is early All Alaska Sweepstakes Dog Sled Race items. The first race was 1908 and ran consecutively until 1917…then was restarted in 1983 and again in 2008...The All Alaska race was the first major sled race….before the Iditarod…It’s a very demanding sport. Although there were check points that followed the telegraph lines…between them the terrain was extreme…The teams are on their own in desolation out in the middle of nowhere basically…against the elements and wolves…Maybe today they have Sat phones but not back then…

One day maybe ten years ago I went to the San Francisco Paper Fair and found a panoramic of a dogsled team from the first All Alaska race…Over the years I’ve gathered a few more things…a program from the 1909 race and marshal’s ribbon…Then recently I spotted a dog sled harness on eBay…There was one for like $700.00…and this one was listed for $256.00 OBO…I figured it would go well with my All Alaska stuff so made a run at it…got it for $180.00…Really I was sort of apprehensive as I had never even seen a dog sled harness…so I was very curious what I was getting into…I did my due diligence and researched it best I could before pulling the trigger…found a guy on-line in Alaska who mushes and asked his opinion…basically he gave the nod…said he had one that had been in a museum…and his attorney had a collection of ten…Plus I learned of other people like me that collect early Alaska…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonhard_Seppala
One of the racers Leonhard Seppala, who won the sweepstakes in 1915, 16 and 17 is especially interesting…see below excerpt from Wikipedia
Role in the "Serum Run" of 1925
A diphtheria outbreak struck Seppala's town of Nome, Alaska in the winter of 1925. Previously unexposed children as well as adults were at risk of dying from the infection. Seppala's only child—an eight-year-old daughter named Sigrid—was also at risk. The only treatment available in 1925 was diphtheria antitoxin serum. However, the town's supply was not only insufficient but also of presumably low efficacy, being past its expiry date. The only practical way to deliver more serum to Nome in the middle of the coldest winter in 20 years was by dog sled. A relay of respected mushers was organized to expedite the delivery, and Seppala (with lead dog Togo) was chosen for the most forbidding part of the trail.[1] The serum was to be taken by train to Nenana, and from there relay teams would set out from Nome and Nenana, meeting in the middle at Nulato. The whole trail was 674 miles from Nenana to Nome, and Seppala was initially selected to cover the more than 400 miles from Nome to Nulato and back. Seppala's section of trail featured a dangerous shortcut across Norton Sound, which could save a full day of travel. It was decided that he was the most qualified of the relay mushers to attempt this shortcut. The ice on Norton Sound was in constant motion due to currents from the sea and the incessant wind. It ranged from rough hills of smashed-together ice to slippery "glare ice" polished by the wind, where it was difficult for the dogs to get a foothold. Small cracks in the ice could suddenly widen, and driver and team could be plunged into the freezing water. If the wind blew from the east, it could reach speeds as high as 70 mph (110 km/h), flipping over sleds, pushing dogs off course, and causing a windchill as low as −100 °F (−73 °C). A sustained east wind could also push the ice out to sea, and a team caught on a drifting floe could find itself stranded on open water. Seppala had taken the shortcut across the Sound several times in his career; a less-experienced musher was likelier to lose not only his life and the lives of his dogs, but also the urgently needed serum. Seppala would cross the sound each way in the race to deliver the serum...

So came the day it arrived…When I pulled it out of the box and spread it out it looked incredible…ancient …way more impressive in person than in the photo…the leather is a bit stiff and cracked but not too bad…and the rivets and attachments look like 1890…but there’s no way to tell…no makers marks…no doubt a professional harness maker made it back in the day…The seller was in Washington state and said he got it at an estate sale…so no telling its origin….it’s possible it could have found its way to Washington from Alaska…Sort of what made me get it was….even though it’s a bit stiff from age and all there’s no missing pieces…it’s all there…

[ooo-ribay]

Most eclectic collection on the planet!!!!

[CarltonHendricks]

I went to a western antiques show in Nevada City last Friday...Kind of a small show at the Elks Lodge...A 2 1/2 hour drive is a long way for a small show but as western antiques go....i.e. anything and everything western...mining, gambling, railroad, cowboy, Indian, guns, etc...you couldn't ask for a more target rich area than Nevada City and surrounding area...so just on that I went...didn't find anything I had to have...I seriously considered a c1900 panoramic photo of a bread company in Los Angeles with horse drawn delivery wagons...but passed...then there was this porcelain sign for harness'...kind of a coincidence since I just bought a dog sled harness...That was one of the best porcelain signs I've ever seen...had Wyatt Earp written all over it...$5,000.00 firm...If you're not familiar with porcelain signs it may not mean much but that was over the top rare...



So you collect sports display antiques, why ya going to a western show you ask...turn over every rock...anything can happen...I've found stuff at western shows before....below a theater poster with a track theme....that I found at the Grass Valley Old West show....







https://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=187684
And same show once I found a group of snap shots of Duke Kahanamoku...see link above...

[mrreality68]

Originally Posted by ooo-ribay

Most eclectic collection on the planet!!!!

100% Agree

An amazing and diverse collection

The real question is

IS there anything he does not collect?
Is there any shop or show that he actually did not buy something from?