Antique & Vintage Postcards

Standing patient and stoic beneath a massive elm whose gnarled roots grip a century of New England soil, the gambrel-roofed Hartwell Farm in Lincoln, Massachusetts looks much as it did when Paul Revere's midnight ride passed near this very road on April 18, 1775 — the farm sits on what is now the Battle Road Trail of Minute Man National Historical Park. This real-photo-style "Photolux" card, published by the American Art Postcard Co. of Boston, presents the two-story colonial farmhouse with its neat flower border in a luminous black-and-white half-tone, card no. 6996. The Hartwell Tavern site (the Hartwell family were prominent Lincoln residents) drew patriotic tourists throughout the mid-20th century. The reverse is entirely unused — no stamp, no message — and shows the clean white stock typical of American Art Postcard Co.'s mid-century output. A penciled price notation appears in the stamp corner.