Crap Car Cards

[Karmann Ghiaman]

Another selection of feeble picture postcards from the Golden Age. We'll do it in three stages: (1)Britain, (2)Europe, (3)USA and Rest of the World. Let's start with London:

 

 

This was sent to my mother in July 1981 with a 14p stamp. I can't read the signature, but he or she was being ironical when they underlined the following from the caption on the back: The London policeman and the London bus are famous the world over. Both the City of London and the Metropolitan Police have a well-deserved reputation for their readiness to help visitors to our capital city.

 

Perhaps they were thinking of the recent riots? Superb Commer van that will bring back many memories. Scaffolding on St Paul's. It compares with this (posted here before) from a slightly earlier age:

 

 

Looks like they had a standard arrangement for that particular cliche. Having visited London, we now come to England's second (in every sense of the word) city, Brummagan:

 

 

Purchased a year or two ago at the airport. Is that a yellow BT van? The bus says The difference is delicious Jersey Royal. (Must remember to get a few kilos at Waitrose on Thursday). We now come to the historic town of Newark on the A1 where nothing much has happened since the Civil War. A recent shopping expedition with my wife resulted in these two gems:

 

 

Local photographer J.M. Antoine who needs to read the bit in the book about lighting. Yellow lines are shit, aren't they? They are put there by people who couldn't give a damn about the hideous effect they inevitably have on even the most historic and lovely street. They just don't want anyone to park there and they don't want any argument about it. Some fine shite can be made out in Monsieur Antoine's murky Kirkgate:

 

 

Another from the same local photographer, this time with a lot of boring sky and magnificent lamp-post:

 

 

It is a landmark building opposite the castle called The Ossington that was erected by Lady Temperance to look like a German beerhall, but when thirsty farmers went inside they could only get tea & coffee. This trick failed, they simply went to the real pub round the corner instead. Superb details here include the tennis girl with the nice ass from that 1970s poster cycling home, and White Van Man parked on some of those famous double yellow lines:

 

 

My father sent this to me on holiday in France in 1965. It shows our home town of Oxford, the Sheldonian Theatre by Sir Christopher Wren:

 

 

This scene is little changed today, except that the filthy building on the right has been cleaned and I think they've finally managed to put the missing statue on the corner of the one to the left (it took about 300 years before they got round to doing it). Magnificent classic crap parked in the old card:

 

 

I'd say that the chap with a peaked hat is a PARKING ATTENDANT. Far from trying to slap a ticket on that Ford Popular, he is GUARDING it. To quote Sandie Shaw: those were the days my friends...

 

Another from 1981, supposedly showing the church at Ditcheat near Shepton Mallet, Somerset:

 

 

One of the worst postcards I have seen - and I collect them. Makes J.M. Antoine look like Bill Brandt. The District View Publishing Company of Leicester is responsible. A pity they didn't wait for some shite to hove into sight round that corner, but two cars can just be made out behind the evocative School sign, justifying its inclusion here. This company, E.T.W. Dennis & Sons of Scarborough, has a much better grasp of how it should be done:

 

 

That was sent in 1984, the price of the stamp having gone up to 16p. Is it an early Metro or a late Maxi? No doubt some expert will i/d it correctly. I hope the old signpost is still there, but one can see Herefordshire C.C. replacing it the same day they come and paint the missing yellow lines everywhere. Advert for pubs in Southwold, posted from Halesworth in 1983:

 

 

Again, allowed here because of a tiny bit of shite showing in the bottom LH corner and in the distance beyond the Adnans ad. This should bring back happy memories of waiting outside with a can of warm Fanta and a packet of Walker's while your parents toasted the lack of Drink Driving laws and risked your 10-year old life within. Beardy man in shorts coming out the door with two drinks in his hands renders this a masterpiece of the card-maker's art.

 

Have saved this till last in the UK section because I know how important caravans are to the Autoshite fraternity:

 

 

This recently cost 50p from a market stall in Arnold, Nottingham. Money well spent! (If anyone knows where Kiln Cliff actually is, it would be interesting to know*). The card has never been sent.

 

*Or has it been eroded away? Don't remember Neil Oliver pointing it out in Coast.

[retrogeezer]

Is it an early Metro or a late Maxi?

 

Eh?? The red car?? Thats a Datsun 120Y.......or am I looking at the wrong pic?

 

Anyway, I love old postcards and often hunt through a few for ones with shite in. There is also a book called crap postcards that is pretty good.

[Karmann Ghiaman]

Thanks retrogeezer! I'm not much good on the Japanese. Please write in & expand on anything shiteworthy, everybody. It's also interesting to hear from anyone who knows the places featured. I was partly inspired by the Crap Postcards book. There's another good one called The Postcard Century where he did every year from 1900 - 1999 in cards from all over. Most excellently, also tells you what it says on the back of them.

 

Ireland, Italy, France, Germany, Spain & Holland to follow soon...

[Station]

I've got two from Spain from the early 90's which I've been meaning to scan in.

[theorganist]

Purchased a year or two ago at the airport. Is that a yellow BT van? The bus says The difference is delicious Jersey Royal.

 

That photo of Birmingham, must be from the late eighties or early nineties. The single decker bus is a Leyland Lynx which WMPTE purchased during 1988 and 1989, most of them had gone by the turn on the millenium. I can just make out a blue and cream WMPTE Metrobus (a livery introduced in the early eighties IIRC, I haven't seen any buses in that livery since c.1992. Infact that grey and blue livery disappeared many many years ago too. So yes that is very likely a yellow BT van.

 

I'll just get my anorak!

[retrogeezer]

Those two top London ones look really 'faked' don't they!

[dollywobbler]

Purchased a year or two ago at the airport. Is that a yellow BT van? The bus says The difference is delicious Jersey Royal.

 

That photo of Birmingham, must be from the late eighties or early nineties. The single decker bus is a Leyland Lynx which WMPTE purchased during 1988 and 1989, most of them had gone by the turn on the millenium. I can just make out a blue and cream WMPTE Metrobus (a livery introduced in the early eighties IIRC, I haven't seen any buses in that livery since c.1992. Infact that grey and blue livery disappeared many many years ago too. So yes that is very likely a yellow BT van.

 

I'll just get my anorak!

 

Yeah, quite like the Brum shot. That paint scheme on the buses didn't last long. They decided to give the upper section a bit more blue. Coming at around the same time as the BT yellow-to-grey, it left Brum looking rather colourless at the time!

[theorganist]

it left Brum looking rather colourless at the time!

 

It certainly did, where I live we had a mixture of the WMPTE liveries and the lovely Midland Red Buses, and some colourful smaller operators. Now it is all generic first group and national express liveries, even the smaller operators have become colourless!

 

Brum has changed quite a lot since those days with some good new developement and is a lot nicer place to visit, including an excellent refurb of the Town Hall.

[Station]

Think our buses in Liverpool/Wirral are light brown/grey. They blend in seamlessly with the light brown/grey buildings.

We used to have a free electric bus that went from Woodside (the Mersey ferry pickup), to Birkenhead town centre, it was great. It was later removed because it was free.

[messerschmitt owner]

Interesting views there - here's two I bought on Saturday in Norwich!

 

daimler depot by messerschmitt owner, on Flickr

 

 

vauxhall 10 four by messerschmitt owner, on Flickr

 

 

I bought about 200 on Saturday to go with the 50,000 I have at home already!

 

What do we all collect? I collect ships on postcards but buy and sell old postcards too.

[Pillock]

Wow, how weird. The two from Newark.... last week I was sat on a bench where that bollard is on the first one (the street is now narrowed to give more room to pedestrians) waiting for a house viewing down the alleyway to the right (Depot Yard). Then, on my way out of Newark I parked in your second postcard, where the Rover is on the left, to make a phone call and found that's a bloody hard spot to reverse out of!

[Karmann Ghiaman]

Please post more car-related cards on this site, especially shite that has 'accidentally' blotted the landscape. Fascinating info about Brum busses has already emerged above. Busketeers will find some more in my...

 

...European Section (with Special Guest Star: Communist Poland). Let's start with the Republic of Ireland, one I sent to mother in 1982 when I took my girlfriend over there for a holiday which the bank manager said we couldn't afford:

 

 

Using brass curtain rails as 'wedding rings' we pretended to be married so as not to offend the pious Irish B&B lady. If you are reading this now, Mrs Darcy, we DID marry in 1987 and are looking forward to our Silver Wedding Anniversary in 2012, so there. Close-up of the vehicular evidence:

 

 

(Also rather attractive student in blue miniskirt waiting for her boyfriend outside Trinity College). The bus people will be happy with that one too.

 

Now it's over to France and the town of Sarlat in the Dordogne:

 

 

I admit that this does not contain any Autoshite so is a little OT. But it's good for your typical French artist-types, and isn't that Graham & Sandra just making their way back to the Victor Estate with a large box of those nice biscuits Shirley brought back when she was here last year? Paris, however, is always guaranteed full o'shite or plein de merde if you are prepared to put it in their own language. It's the Place Vendome:

 

 

And a closer look at the merdeuses, which their many fans here at Autoshite will enjoy:

 

 

This was sent by my mother's dotty friend Barbara D and includes the line Am also trying to learn some French. As she was already about 65, shows it's never too late to try.

 

Dieppe 1985:

 

 

OK, it's another one without any cars, but their owners & the dog will have to do since it's been pedestrianised. I like to think that the boy in trunks & trainers is English and still goes there, dressed exactly the same way, except that he's now covered in tats with a massive beergut & shaven head.

 

Over to Germany, Freiburg im Breisgau:

 

 

This is justified by the blue van setting up at the market. Really rather a good picture by Herr J. Gass of March-Nourshausen. Anyway, here's something more up our street from Bad Aachen:

 

 

Yes, it is pretty bad. Let us zoom in on the shite:

 

 

Is that a Passat S Variant waiting for the Burgermeister to come out from a late night session at the Rathaus? Please don't tell me it's Japanese, shite should be locally-built (even if they were allies in WW2).

 

Another OT one without any cars, but it is so creepy that you really must be allowed to share in it:

 

 

The 3 Little Anorexics in Bremen, 1984. This was clearly posed by Gunter Reinhard, no doubt intending to bring out the funny tall thin house behind them, ha, ha, ha. He must be a very bad, sick man. Though I didn't send this card, have been to Bremen and can vouch that all those buildings were reduced to ashes by RAF Bomber Command, but have been rebuilt exactly as they were.

 

Thought this was Italy, but in fact it's Tarragona on the Costa Dorada, Spain:

 

 

No doubt the Romans built it though. Good how the modern road just goes round on both sides, and I like the out-of-focus shittifers zooming by:

 

 

 

Definitely a 2CV van & some sort of Fiat (? made under licence in Spain?) going by.

 

My late father sent this, rather oddly, from America on 8 September 1985:

 

 

It has a typical message from him: I still haven't found the paper with the score of the last day of the sixth Test - a problem later solved for us when abroad by the magic of the internet. Here's the Barcelona carpark:

 

 

Don't think the stadium is full (yet) since the red areas are just empty stands and no players on the pitch.

 

The Italians can be guaranteed proudly to include plenty of shite amongst their majestic ruins:

 

 

This is the Forum in Rome itself. There's always good parking right next to churches there:

 

 

Forgive me Father, for I have sinned. How have you transgressed, my son? I have parked right in front of Michaelangelo's bascilica, ensuring a shitty Fiat in every photo...

 

Also in Rome, Piazza Navona:

 

 

Think there's a yellow Anglia between those two tritons:

 

 

Finally in the European selection, one my sister sent from Wroclaw, Poland in '83:

 

 

Two good market vans - presumably ZILs or GAZs? Soviet Era vanfans please reveal - and some sort of Trabant broken down on the far right. Plenty of flowers, but nothing to eat at that particular market. Probably heaving with British stags & hens now, 27 years later; Poles driving round in Mercs.

[Spottedlaurel]

Excellent stuff.

 

This is one of the worst I possess. I don’t go out of my way to pick up old postcards, but I’ll usually have a rummage through a box of them in search of overly bright blue skies and 1960s-80s street scenes.

 

Old Postcard - Merrydown Wine Co, Horam, Sussex by Spottedlaurel, on Flickr

 

Quite an early P4 I think?

[Andrew353w]

That Southwold one brings back memories... I've drunk (and been drunk!) in The Sole Bay Inn, probably on Adnam's "Broadside" ale, which, after a few I usually order as "Broadsword", as my favourite film is "Where Eagles Dare"!

 

That whole coastline's really pretty! Southwold, Aldborough, Orford Ness, Dunwich, Minsmere... They're all lovely!

 

Fantastic cards-great collection!

[Gompo]

Great thread KG, nice to see the recognisable Newark ones inparticular.

[Inspector Morose]

 

London bus? That's an ex Ribble/Standerwick "Gay Hostess" Atlantean and the one used in one of the On The Buses films IIRC.

 

I'll get me coat.

[chaseracer]

 

Has the chauffeur just driven into the wall...?

[Karmann Ghiaman]

Think that Daimler ad is explaining to these new-fangled motorists that you take it round the back where you used to put your horses & carriage. Or at least you tell your man to...

 

Here's my USA and the Rest of the World selection, starting with Chalet Wasserhaus:

 

 

The eejit, you're thinking, that's in Switzerland; but in fact it's in Monroe, Wisconsin, this being the giveaway:

 

 

Don't think it's a Ford, US experts will be able to label it correctly for sure. Slightly sickening late '70s/early '80s view of Boulder, Colorado from the Boulder-Denver Turnpike:

 

 

And homing in on the traffic:

 

 

It will be observed that the following Texas scenes are from one of those fold-out sets, though they are double sided so could never be sent as individual cards. These 2 don't contain any shite, but are too good to omit:

 

 

Cannot take a place called Waco seriously, even if they did have the David Koresh Cult Massacre there. The beach is just a bit perfect; tragic that no cars have been brought down onto it, but we can't have everything. This pair don't disappoint, however:

 

 

Ronald's car outside his observatory:

 

 

And Miz Ellie's:

 

 

Exquisite. For those who like cable cars, one from San Francisco in 1986:

 

 

Hope you can see the bevelled edge OK. My dad's message: I see we lost the second Test, with Embury's 75 the top score in our second innings! What are our so-called batsmen for? Bracewell showed up our bowlers too. So he obviously managed to get hold of a paper from Blighty that year.

 

A really lovely New York card from the 1930s, admittedly bought in a shop in England (for only a few pence):

 

 

For fans of classic American cars, a close-up:

 

 

Don't fancy the chances of the black one stuck between those two trams... That card reminded me of this from the great Bruce McCall:

 

 

Back to Boulder where the late father went to a lot of conferences in the early '80s. The shite is quite well hidden in this one, but it's there:

 

 

I've often been to Boston (yes, the one in Massachussets, not the original in nearby Lincolnshire), but never registered this Aztec Human Sacrifice Temple till I got the unsent card at a junk shop in England:

 

 

Better look at the crud there:

 

 

Seems that Telecom van went to the wrong Boston. Back to California for this, again sadly carless, but in keeping with the general theme:

 

 

From Judy & John, apparently postmarked 1992, by which time it was already retro.

 

Absolute gem from New Zealand:

 

 

It says on the back All good wishes to you both for Christmas & the New Year from Hilda & Bill - We are both very well & hope you are too - This is a photograph of the main street in our prosperous city - (Gisborne - isn't that where one of the baddies in Robin Hood comes from?)

 

Finally one that has nothing whatsoever to do with cars, but they were in the box and just had to be included. Paul sent it from an obvious place, but since he didn't include one, & the Egyptians failed to postmark it, date unknown:

 

 

That would be hardcore in Iran or Afghanistan.

[Justin Case]

Some great cards there, thanks for posting

 

 

By a strange coincidence we were in Weobley on Saturday. I'm not sure if the pub is the Salutation, which had a wedgshape Lotus Elite in the yard. Other highlights were a garage with roadside pumps and diesel at 63p per half-litre (things change slowly in Herefordshire so I suppose they're still waiting for the pumps to be recalibrated) and when we got back to the car there was an immaculate Volvo 360GLT parked behind us, complete with supplying dealer's sticker sill in the back window. Next time I'll take my camera.

[Karmann Ghiaman]

If you could try to get a shot from where the postcard picture was taken, alfisti, that would be brilliant! Would love to know if the sign's still there. The road is probably choked with ugly modern cars & lost Latvian lorry-drivers.

 

In the last lot, forgot to point out Woolworths in San Francisco and the ever-present red Beetle that appears in about 1 in 20 old cards (on the Denver-Boulder Turnpike). Hope everyone can find more old cards or show what some of these places look like today.

[Justin Case]

If you could try to get a shot from where the postcard picture was taken, alfisti, that would be brilliant! Would love to know if the sign's still there. The road is probably choked with ugly modern cars & lost Latvian lorry-drivers.

:

 

Unfortunately I'm unlikely to be going back there for a bit, but as nothing seems to have changed for about 500 years, a few weeeks or even months shouldn't make any difference, but I'll try and remember There are a few modern cars around, but it is in one of the most shite-stacked parts of England and as a bonus doesn't seem to be on any Latvian sat-navs

[chaseracer]

...late '70s/early '80s view of Boulder, Colorado from the Boulder-Denver Turnpike:

 

 

That will be completely 'urbanized' by now...

[eddyramrod]

 

The eejit, you're thinking, that's in Switzerland; but in fact it's in Monroe, Wisconsin, this being the giveaway:

 

 

Don't think it's a Ford

 

Actually it is! It's either a Fairlane or Galaxie from about 1966. I can't see enough detail to be more specific. Sorry.

[flat4alfa]

Golden Cap, Lyme Regis

 

I bought this in 2008 in a shop on the front!

 

[flat4alfa]

Anyone got a we've seen the lions at Longleat sticker?

 

 

[Richard]

Anyone got a we've seen the lions at Longleat sticker?

 

No, but that reminded me of this Volvo 850 I saw at John o' Groats last year.

 

Holiday 041 by RichardB5, on Flickr

 

Holiday 042 by RichardB5, on Flickr

[Karmann Ghiaman]

Golden Cap, Lyme Regis

 

I bought this in 2008 in a shop on the front!

 

 

 

Is that Golden Cap or Golden Crap?

 

When I was a kid we went to Longleat with an old trunk sticking out the boot of my Mum's mini (Bruv was at boarding school nearby, so we combined fetching him with going to see the lions). A baboon took a big bite out of trunk, which we still have with conversation piece monkeybite. The Mini's wipers survived however.

[In The Pit]

Have saved this till last in the UK section because I know how important caravans are to the Autoshite fraternity:

 

 

This recently cost 50p from a market stall in Arnold, Nottingham. Money well spent! (If anyone knows where Kiln Cliff actually is, it would be interesting to know*). The card has never been sent.

 

*Or has it been eroded away? Don't remember Neil Oliver pointing it out in Coast.

 

A quick check on the net shows its still going and is near Mundesley on the North Norfolk coast, see a picture here http://www.kilncliffsholidayhomesmundesley.co.uk/ (with the kiln featured on your card). You should email them a scan of the postcard I bet they'd love to see it.