1907 Thanksgiving postcard

Happy Thanksgiving. There's a lot to unpack in this 1907 postcard published by The Rose Company. Let's start with the illustration on the front. At the top, there's a golden crown. Underneath the crown is a turkey. And the turkey is standing on a shield that has the design of the United States of America's flag, over the top of which is printed these words:

Europe has its turkey

Asia has the same

But the turkey

of America

Is King ~

of all the game

With the crown and the turkey and the pro-America message this card hits in some disconcerting ways in 2025, but that's all my personal projection based upon our current moment with kings and "turkeys" and America First.¹

If I had to speculate, I'd say this is a fairly harmless Thanksgiving postcard that's being a bit playful in touting American exceptionalism during an era when the United States' global power was rising. If anyone has any insights or alternate interpretations of this card, I'd love to read them in the comments.

There are cursive messages on both the front and back of this postcard, which was sent from Newton, New Jersey, to Lowell, Massachusetts, in late November 1907. The message on the front states:

Did you know Mr Hiles [?] has the Typhoid Fever?

Someone having typhoid fever in 1907 would have been a serious medical issue. Though mortality rates were on the decline at that point, thousands of Americans were still dying of the disease. Within just a few years, though, sanitation measures including water filtration, chlorination and pasteurization tamed typhoid's spread, and the military was using a proven vaccine to protect troops in high-risk areas.

The note on the back is a rather perfunctory:

Dear friend:

Rec'd your postal and hope you think of me again real soon. Thanking you for same.

Previous Thanksgiving posts

• Public service announcement that's still relevant
• Bettina's Thanksgiving in the country (and more meal suggestions)
• Nostalgic school bulletin-board material for Thanksgiving
• Three colorful vintage Thanksgiving postcards featuring turkeys
• Stock photo of pilgrims and a dead turkey from a 1940 magazine
• 1971 Thanksgiving gift edition of Ideals magazine
• If you still need a Thanksgiving dessert, make some strawberry pie
• I'd blame the tryptophan, but cat pileups like this happen every day
• 1950 Thanksgiving ads
• (Missing) snapshot & memories: Thanksgiving
• Happy Thanksgiving: Enjoy vintage anthropomorphic vegetables
• Thanksgiving postcard from 1914, plus a little guffaw

Footnote

1. I had a whole rant forming in my head, but I'll be good since today is a holiday. My head is spinning, anyways. I'm not sure if we're barreling toward a repeat of 1789, a repeat of 1933 or some new mixture that future historians simply refer to as "shades of 2026."