Antique & Vintage Postcards

A golden-haired child gazes out with pure delight as a graceful young mother — her chestnut hair swept up in the high Edwardian fashion — presses a tender kiss to the child's cheek, a chocolate-brown heart brimming with forget-me-nots tucked at her side, in this sumptuously embossed color-lithograph Valentine card copyrighted by the celebrated publisher John Winsch in 1911. The embossing gives the figures an almost sculptural dimensionality — the mother's white gown, the child's billowing sleeves and tiny posy of pink flowers, the velvety heart all rising from the ivory card stock with satisfying tactile relief. Winsch cards, printed in Germany before WWI, are among the most sought-after American holiday postcards for their exceptional printing quality and charming sentimental imagery. The motto "My Valentine … think of me" is lettered in elegant red and gilt Gothic script. The reverse — also heavily embossed through-and-through — is unused, with the standard Winsch domestic (1¢) / foreign (2¢) postage notice. A pencilled name, possibly "Emma Hanna" or similar, appears vertically on the message side.