Postcards are the calling card for these collectors

When Karen Martin started collecting postcards, her mother was surprised that anyone would consider these cards — which sold for a penny or two in their heyday — worth saving, much less studying and pursuing.

“She was fascinated by the fact that something people used for routine communication while she was growing up were now collectibles,” recalls Martin, 59, of Huntington Station.

But as she and her fellow collector and husband, Stephen Martin, can attest to, there is more to these little paper rectangles than a canceled stamp, a faded address and a scribbled message from long ago. The Martins are members of the Long Island Postcard Club, and they and their fellow members make a convincing case that collecting picture postcards is at least as worthwhile a hobby as stamps, coins and comics. Many of these cards — first introduced in the United States in the early 1890s — are witty, informative and creative; some rise to the status of art, and almost all provide intriguing windows into the past.

On a recent Saturday, a dozen longtime members of the club, which was founded in 1977, gathered in a meeting room at Christ Lutheran Church in East Northport to show off their collections, many of which will be on display for the group’s 41st annual show and sale at the church on Saturday, April 7. Organized in vinyl and leather albums with each card in its own protective sleeve, these eclectic collections are as distinctive as their owners’ personalities and passions.

Take Carol Peluso of West Hempstead. About 10 years ago, she accompanied her husband, Thomas, a graphic artist, to a show in which stamps, postcards and other forms of printed ephemera were on display and for sale. She was shocked by the sweep of subject matter represented in the overflowing boxes and binders set up on dealers’ tables. “I looked around, and said ‘I’ll take one of everything,’ ” she recalls. “My husband said, ‘No, you have to narrow it down.’ ”

She did, choosing to focus initially on two subjects near and dear. “Nurses, because I’m a nurse,” she explains. “And dachshunds, because we have two” — named Oscar and Mayer.

A decade later, Peluso, now 68, has hundreds of postcards on these two topics. The canine cards, many of which are from Europe, would probably shock even Oscar and Mayer: There are cartoon images of dachshunds on skis. Dachshunds climbing mountains. Dachshunds dressed in human clothes. And, what she calls “the prize piece of my collection” — a 1906 four-card “installment” series from Britain, designed to be mailed one at a time. Lined up, the cards form one long, complete dachshund from nose to tail.

“I send you the head of a dachshund today,” reads the first card. “Wait for the next part, don’t throw this away.”

Peluso certainly won’t. She paid $40 for it and believes she could probably now sell it for twice as much. “But I never would,” she says. “I’m collecting these because I love them.”

Compared to other collectibles, no one is getting rich collecting postcards. As club president Gordon Smith points out, while a mint condition issue of Superman #1 or an upside-down airplane stamp can command millions, “even the best postcards are still affordable to most collectors.”

Postcards close to home

While the scope of the hobby is global, some members of the group focus on cards close to home, and in the process, shed light on overlooked aspects of Long Island history. Josh Soren of Wantagh is an expert on the High Hill Beach summer community that existed in the early 20th century on the East End of what is now Jones Beach State Park. The postcards he has found depicting High Hill, as well as early Wantagh images, are part of the presentations he gives at local libraries and historical societies. “It’s definitely spurred me on to learn more,” he says of his collecting.

Soren, 65, is a past president of the club, which was founded by the man who could be called Long Island’s original deltiologist (the fancy name for a postcard collector), Ray Di Maria, 89. Di Maria’s interest was sparked when he bought a Bay Shore bungalow in the 1970s, and found boxes of old postcards, many of which depicted scenes of life on the Great South Bay. “A hobby was born,” he says, with a smile.

Within a year or two, he was traveling to shows throughout New York and New Jersey. His wife, sister and brother-in-law accompanied him to one such event, organized by a postcard-collecting group in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. They were so impressed, Di Maria recalls, “When we got home, they said, ‘Why don’t we have a club like that on Long Island?’ ”

The next year, they did. “I promised we’d have 100 members and 100 dollars in the bank,” recalls Di Maria. According to the current president, the club now has about 250 members, although he acknowledges that most of them are north of 60. “We’re trying to get younger members,” says Smith, 72, of Ridge.

Seeking younger members

The aging issue is not unique to this organization, although one couple in the club may have come up with a strategy to draw in younger members.

The Huttles of Hicksville — Joe, 75 and Corinne, “not 75” — collect postcards related to the Long Island Rail Road, the Brooklyn Bridge and vintage images of Nassau-Suffolk towns from Woodmere to Sag Harbor.

“We have friends in their 30s,” says Corinne. “When they come over, we’ve asked them what town they come from. Joe pulls out historical cards from that town, which they’re fascinated by. And of course, everybody loves the Brooklyn Bridge.”

While some collectors pay little attention to the messages scribbled on the backs of the cards, Joe Huttle enjoys seeing who was saying what to whom — even if many of the messages are of the banal, “Having a good time” variety. One of his cards, however, with an image of the Brooklyn Bridge sent in the early 1900s, bears an inscription and address that sound like they could be the basis for a sequel to “The Alienist.”

The handwritten message: “Breaker of horses and glass windows.”

The recipient: Mr. Frank Smith, Rome Cemetery, Rome, New York.

If that disquieting message sends a chill down one’s spine, a collection by Stephen Martin, 60, is heartwarming. It’s a set of about 160 cards, sent between 1942 and 1944 by two sweethearts — a young lady in upstate Beacon and her boyfriend, serving in World War II. In scribbled one- or two-line messages, their day-by-day joys, travails and sorrows (or at least those that passed muster with wartime censors) are played out in a back-and-forth series of cartoonish postcards, some of them slightly risqué.

Martin bought the entire set from a dealer. “He offered to sell them individually,” Martin says. “I said ‘You can’t break these up!’ ” He then did research on the couple and learned that the young man returned home to marry his sweetheart, and they lived happily ever after — just like their postcards, which are now in the hands of people who appreciate them; and recognize that there is more to this hobby than a piece of 16-point stock paper.

“It’s histories and memories and stories,” says Stephen Martin. “It’s a whole lot more than just a postcard.”