Best Christmas Wishes 1908
A 101 years later, a look at a Christmas card from a major Calcutta retailer.
Kolkata
Continental Pneumatic Carriage Tyres
Before there were cars, there were carriages, and even these could benefit from pneumatic tyres which were inflated by air and led to more comfortable rides.
Our Clerical Staff Babu City Clerk
The babu, or educated Bengali bureaucrat, could be said to have held the Raj in the twirl of an umbrella. Babus were a new species that blossomed during colonial rule, hybrids of Western needs and Indian traditions.
Parsi Athletes
The relationship of Parsis and athletics was a oft-discussed issue in the late 19th and early 20th century, with a tradition from Persia of Parsi marital arts and various muscle men who distinguished themselves set against popular conceptions of the
A Hill Coolie Girl
"The professional photographers of Darjeeling generated innumerable prints depicting those whose toil supported the lifestyles of the colonialists in their homes and businesses, and who created products they loved to consumer," writes Claire Harris
Sind Water Carriers
A rather rare postcard of Sindhi female water carriers, even if it was posed in a studio, and, on the back addressed from Kirkee cantonment near Poona on May 2, 1917: "I see the women go through camp every day carrying these pots, some are
Calcutta
[Original] Durga - Great Eastern Hotel - Telegraph Office - Snake Charmers [end]
A card from the earliest known series of Calcutta postcards by the Austrian photographer W.
Lahore. Char Boorji.
The Chaburji gateway is the entrance to a lost Mughal garden. Apparently built around the 1640s, its construction is linked to the Mughal Emperor Akbar's daughter, Zebunnissa Begum.
Calcutta. Burmese Pagoda Eden Gardens.
Lord Dalhousie brought the Burmese Pagoda from Prome in Burma in 1854 as a token of conquest of an area that was ruled as part of the British Raj.
A Bhistee [Watercarrier]
![A Bhistee [Watercarrier]](https://www.paperjewels.org/sites/default/files/styles/square_thumbnail/public/slides/a-bhistee_0.jpg?itok=DCLgU_Ef "A Bhistee [Watercarrier]")
One of the most popular subjects of early postcards was the water-carrier, shown here together with a buffalo. Perhaps Hobson Jobson's definition for what it spells as "Bheesty" helps to explain why (1903, p.
