Rising imperiously above the corner of downtown Syracuse in the Gilded Age's confident architectural grammar, the University Block — a handsome Romanesque-meets-Renaissance Revival tower clad in pale stone — dominates this 1907 real-photo-style halftone card, its ground-floor arched arcade bustling with pedestrians and telegraph wires strung like a cat's cradle between poles. The card carries one of the more charming postcard inscriptions of the era, scrawled boldly across the image face: "don't be afraid of this card it has not been where the fever is or any…" — a wry reassurance presumably related to a typhoid or scarlet fever outbreak circulating in Syracuse at the time. Postmarked January 23, 1907, in Syracuse and addressed to Mrs. Thomas Ferry at 240 South Morris Street, Dover, New Jersey, the reverse is densely covered in a flowing hand describing Sunday activities, a church visit, and social rounds in the city.