Antique & Vintage Postcards

A solitary woman in a blue rebozo rides side-saddle on a heavily laden burro, clay water-jugs roped to the animal's flanks, a dusty Mexican street receding behind her — a travel photograph transformed into a tinted souvenir postcard that encapsulates the romantic, if paternalistic, gaze of early 20th-century American tourism toward its southern neighbor. Postmarked San Diego, November 1, 1929 — just days after the stock market crash that would define a generation — this card was sent to Florence in Rochester, New York, with a chatty message about Coronado Beach, San Diego city tours, and a "blond" acquaintance. Published by the Lower California Commercial Co., which served the Tijuana–Mexicali–Ensenada–Tecate corridor, it is a vivid artifact of cross-border leisure tourism at its interwar peak.