This "Genuine Curteich-Chicago" linen postcard shows off the "Municipal Rose Garden, Another Beauty Spot in Harrisburg, Pa."
Today, this spot is a parking lot.
sad emoji / angry emoji
But I'm getting ahead of myself. PennLive.com's Deb Kiner did a nice little history piece in 2015 about the rose garden. Some historical highlights, and one lowlight:
- The Municipal Rose Garden along North Third Street in Harrisburg to the west of Polyclinic Hospital was dedicated on Sept. 15, 1938.
- It featured thousands of rosebushes and a reflecting pool measuring 20 feet by 317 feet.
- The garden included the "Dance of Eternal Spring" fountain now at Italian Lake. [For much more about the fountain, see Kiner's article.]
- The garden eventually was converted by the hospital into a parking lot, leaving the statue on a small patch of green for a while. [Kiner's article doesn't give a date for when paradise was paved over, but I'm guessing it was sometime in the 1960s.]
This postcard was once glued into someone's scrapbook and then damaged significantly when, many years later, it was removed from that book. I bought it for a pittance in an antique store. There's a tear on the card and half of the back came off when it was separated from the glue. Thus, this is the only part of the cursive pencil message that remains:
Dear Unc. Andy
worse
I ... out
to ... park yes-
..day. Now I am
home in bed a-
gain.
love
Warren [?]
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