Jigsaw for March 8, 2026: 1907 Postcard of Fairlee
Too many pieces? Too few? How to customize your puzzle
A kind soul loaned her postcard collection to the Norwich Historical Society for use in our weekly jigsaw puzzles.
It was a beautiful set of cards, but this one of Fairlee from 1907 grabbed my attention. I had never seen it before, but had climbed those same cliffs.
As I looked more closely, something didn’t look quite real.
As I learned more, I discovered that postcard companies often started with a photograph, then redrew and enhanced it so the fields, river, and buildings looked idealized, almost like a miniature landscape painting.
Many were actually lithographs, made in Germany, using as many as 20 separate color plates.
I now look at local landscapes through the lens of mile-high glaciers and Lake Hitchcock. Can you imagine a glacial lake bottom forming those beautiful flat fields?
How close was the artist’s rendition?
Here are two photographs taken more than a century apart.
1910:
2025:
More about postcards: Linen Postcards
More than you probably want to know about the Golden Age of Postcards
Other photos of interest:
More photos of Fairlee from the Internet Archive
Thanks for reading,
Cameron Cross
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