Cotton Cart
Cotton was the product that helped put 19th century Mumbai on the road to becoming one of the world's major cities. The product was celebrated on postcards like this virtual painting.
Clifton & Co.
A Cobbler
Itinerant workers, cobblers can repair all sorts of things. Note the sophisticated lithographic printing of this image, which some early Clifton & Co.
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.
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.
Arhai-Din-Ka-Jhopra, Ajmere
A striking collotype published in many versions by Clifton & Co. The Arhai-Din-Ka-Jhopra was built in the 13th century by the first Muslim Sultan in India, Qutb-ud-Din Aibak, and before him by Abu Bar of Herat, Afghanistan.
Water Bullock
Bullocks that ferried water were called "water bullocks." This colored image by Clifton & Company, one of the earliest mass publishers of postcards in Mumbai (Bombay) was fairly popular, perhaps because of its rich colors.
Parsi Girl
A striking image of a small Parsi girl sitting on a table with her feet on a chair, the "de [of] Bombay" added by the French sender in 1911.
