India - Burma
An advertising card for the Singer Manufacturing Company showing how universal the use of its sewing machines was, and perhaps how easily they could be used by women to create pillows and beautiful cloths.
Halftone
Indian Tea Garden Coolie Girl
Postcards of the tea industry were popular in the early 20th century and helped spread consumption of the product grown in northeast and South India and Ceylon [Sri Lanka]. Women and children often picked the tea leaves, and this worker, likely from
Telegraph Peon
Another Dhurandhar postcard that captures the essence and humour of a telegraph peon using a bicycle to rush to his destination.
[Karla Station]
![[Karla Station]](https://www.paperjewels.org/sites/default/files/styles/square_thumbnail/public/slides/karla-station_0.jpg?itok=ktTgi9Gt "[Karla Station]")
This postcard shows a scene at the platform of Karla railway station outside Mumbai where The Ravi Varma Press was headquartered. On the platform, a barefoot man is holding a stick, another is smoking a hookah.
Four Kandyan Girls, Ceylon
This image published by The Colombo Apothecaries is apparently based on an original albumen photograph taken in the 1870s or 1880s by the British photographer Charles Scowen who sold his negatives to the firm when he tried to become a planter in
Grand Oriental Hotel Colombo
Tea was one of those commodities that benefitted from the marketing that came with postcards, going back to the late 1890s.
Veddahs. Wild men of Ceylon
This postcard of the original inhabitants of Sri Lanka [Ceylon] was made from a photograph by Charles Scowen, one of the great photographers of the 19th century, as was likely taken in the 1870s.
Fruit Seller
Note the rich character on this man's face in an image by M.V. Dhurandhar, one of India's most exceptional and prolific early 20th century painters and postcard artists.
Sent to Master E.
Madras Seven Pagodas
While we now believe that the temples date to the Pallava King Narasimharavan around 630 CE, much about their origins remains obscure. This is an embossed postcard, with the relief lines meant to simulate an old oil painting.
[Original caption] Seven
Birth of Shakuntala
Vishvamitra was a revered sage in ancient India; this postcard from one of Ravi Varma's most famous paintings shows how he rejects knowledge of his child by turning away and hiding his gaze with a dramatic gesture.
[Original caption] Menaka sent by
