Then and Now: The Timeless Quality of Lake Quannapowitt

That scenery on Lake Quannapowitt is more timeless than you might think. This postcard currently for sale on eBay shows the lake as it appeared to some artist one nice summer day back in 1908 or so. The thing is, the image almost looks like something you’d find today if you set up an easel on that spot, which appears to be near the waterfront close to the town common.  I added a recently taken photo from nearby just to illustrate. 

Another thing about this postcard is that it boasts one of those casual communications by mail that seemed to go on all the time back in the days of postage for a penny and before electronics. As a history and old-time relics enthusiast, I find those postcards to be very interesting bits of long-ago daily life. 

This particular postcard has a woman named Edith writing to her friend Ellie in Westbrook, Maine with a cryptic line about “I too was very, very much disappointed but it could not be helped.” Other postcards from around that era would have had a woman named Edith writing to a woman named Ethel – or a woman named Phyllis writing to a woman named Margaret – or possibly to somebody named Agnes. But I digress.