A crowded paddle steamer pressed to the wharf, Tower Bridge looming through the industrial haze beyond — this vivid color-lithograph card captures the working Thames at full bustle in the early twentieth century, when London Bridge Wharf was the departure point for pleasure steamers heading to seaside resorts along the Essex and Kent coasts. Dozens of passengers throng the vessel's open decks while dock workers and well-dressed Edwardians alike crowd the stone quay below, advertisement boards for steamer fares plastered on the red-brick warehouse at left. The sender, who signs only "H," posted this card from London around 1917 to Kenneth in Austin, Illinois — a western suburb of Chicago — teasing about Latin class, congratulating him on no longer being a "freshie," and noting with wry humor that he has held onto Kenneth's American dollar rather than spending it. Two ½d King George V stamps (green) frank the card, a common wartime rate for overseas postcards.