Sampling and Weighing Cotton
Mumbai grew from the 1860s through the 1890s largely because of the international cotton trade, which went from exporting cotton to textile manufacturing mills dotting the city.
Clifton & Co.
Group of famine stricken victims
There were numerous famines during the Raj, some like this one around the turn of the century, often simultaneous with plagues that came to Bombay by ship.
An Indian Bungalow
An Indian Bungalow or single story house.
The word bungalow derives from the Gujarati word baṅglo and means "Bengali", used to communicate "house in the Bengal style". Such houses were traditionally small, thatched and had a wide veranda.
Ancient Buddhist Temple Gwalior
Buddhism had largely departed India by this time, having flourished between the 3rd century BCE and 13th century CE, but its temples still stood and were frequently subjects of postcards.
A Mohamedan dancing Girl in Attitude
This so-called "chromo-collotype" card was created by running an image derived from a black and white photograph through multiple color runs, after each color had dried, creating rich and translucent images.
A Table Servant
Note the liquor bottle, likely whisky and soda on the tray in the khitmatgar's hands.
A Kashmir Woman
This woman, in a similar pose on a postcard published by and from a photograph by Fred Bremner, was called "A Punditani (Hindu) Kashmir." Inasmuch as titles were fluid, the same image, above, was called "A Daughter of Noah Dal Lake Kashmir" in a
A Village Belle, Kashmir
A remarkable portrait, probably taken by the photographer Fred Bremner many of whose images of Kashmir were published by Clifton and Co., one of the earliest all-India postcard publishers.
A Cobbler
An early postcard that blends photography, the collotype printing process and colorization to produce what the Germans called a "Lichtdruck" or "light print" that resembles a painting.
A Bania Lady
A beautiful example of colorization, with the rich brown of wood and skin set off against the black and white original studio backdrop. On the back, one owner has pencilled in "Hindu Bourgeois."
