Want to say "hello" from Disneyland? Send a post card!
Beautifulscenes(戏剧)ofparadise (乐园), wild animals, silly pictures — you can find them all in one place. Where? On a post card! Have people always sent post cards? No. Before post cards, people liked sealed letters.
The idea for the firstdecorated (装饰)post card came to John P. Charlton in 1861. He thought a simple card with decorations would be a great way to send a note. Then in the late 1800s, post cards with pictures appeared. By law, people had to write their note on the front —on the picture! The back was only for the address. Several years later, England allowed a divided-back post card. Then people could write their note on the back left side and put the address on the right. During the early 1900s, the golden age of post cards, picture post cards became a craze of the world. In 1908, Americans alone mailed over 677 million post cards. Today, post cards are the third most popular collection in the world after stamps and coins.