A Trip down The Wabash in Old Postcards

Terre Haute (4)

On the Banks of the Wabash River, Terre Haute, Indiana

This unused linen postcard has the printed text...

23
27869
Pub. by Levin Brothers, Terre Haute, Ind.
Made in U. S. A. by E. C. Kropp Co., Milwaukee, WIS. - (GJF)

Wabash River at Fort Harrison, Terre Haute, Indiana

This postcard, stamped in West Terre Haute on March 24th, 1924, has the printed text...

27869N
E. C. Kropp Co., Milwaukee

On the Banks of the Wabash River, Terre Haute, Indiana

This postcard, stamped in Terre Haute on June 1st, 1935, has the printed text...

OA3709 [1930]
On the Banks of the Beautiful Wabash River, Terre Haute, Ind.
Courtesy Terre Haute Chamber of Commerce
Published by T. H. News & Magazine Agency Inc., Terre Haute, Ind.
CT Chicago
C. T. American Art Colored

I have another copy of this postcard that was stamped in Terre Haute on June 3rd, 1934.

I also have another, unused copy of this postcard, and another copy that was stamped in Terre Haute on 17th February, 1943 that both have the printed text...

OA3709-N
On the Banks of the Beautiful Wabash River, Terre Haute, Ind.
Courtesy Terre Haute Chamber of Commerce
Wabash Valley News Agency, Inc., Terre Haute, Ind.
Genuine Curteich - Chicago "C.T. American Art" Post Card (Reg. U. S. Pat. Off.)

On the Banks of the Beautiful Wabash River, Terre Haute, Indiana

This unused postcard has the printed text...

OA-H968 [1930]
Wabash Valley News Agency Inc., Terre Haute, Ind.
Genuine Curteich-Chicago "C.T. Art-Colortone" Post Card (Reg. U.S. Pat. Off.)

Exactly the same photograph was used for a Vincennes postcard. The card serial number is the same and so is the Curteich information but the publisher was A. A. Arnold, Vincennes, Indiana.

Wabash River, Terre Haute, Indiana

This unused postcard has the printed text...

Wabash River
Terre Haute, Indiana
This view was taken from Fairbanks Park in
Terre Haute, Indiana. It is one of the many
beautiful scenes in this area of Indiana.

Photo by John V. Pontiere, Jr.

45990
Estell Wholesale Co., 518 Arrowhead Dr., Seymour, Ind., 47274

The Wabash River is a 475 mile(765 km) long river in the eastern United States that flows southwest from northwest Ohio near St. Henry, Ohio across northern Indiana to Illinois where it forms the southern Illinois-Indiana border before draining into the Ohio River, of which it is the largest northern tributary.

When the Wisconsin Glacier melted 14,000 years ago, part of the meltwaters formed the proglacial Lake Maumee, the ancestor to Lake Erie. Eventually the meltwaters overtopped a glacial moraine located near Fort Wayne, Indiana, and catastrophically drained southwestward in the Maumee Torrent. The torrent carved the wide alluvial valley that the Wabash uses today.

The name "Wabash" is an English spelling of the French name for the river, "Ouabache." French traders named the river after the Miami Indian word for the river, waapaahsiiki, meaning "it shines white". The Miami name reflected the clarity of the river in Huntington County, Indiana where the river bottom is limestone. This is a historical oddity since today the river bottom is no longer visible due to water pollution and agricultural siltation.

The Wabash was mapped and named by French explorers to the Mississippi, including the sections now known as the Ohio River. For 200 years, from the mid-1600s into the 1800s, the Wabash was a major trading route, linking Canada, Quebec and the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River.

On March 14, 1913, Paul Dresser's song, "On the Banks of the Wabash, Far Away" became the state song of Indiana.

The next postcards show the Old Wagon Bridge...

Old Wagon Bridge, Terre Haute, Ind.

This postcard posted in Terre Haute on June 11th, 1906, has no other printed text. I have another copy of this postcard that was posted in Terre Haute on august 9th, 1906.

Old Wagon Bridge, Terre Haute, Ind.

This postcard stamped in Farmersburg on July 7th, 1909, has the printed text...

Made expressly for S. H. Knox & Co.
Printed in Germany

Old Wagon Bridge, Terre Haute, Ind.

This postcard stamped on 6th January 1911, contains no other text apart from the number 8902.

Old Wagon Bridge, Terre Haute, Ind.

This unused postcard has the printed text...

165311
#88
Exclusive Project by the House of Photography
Robert W. Harvey with the help of Dorothy J. Clark, Local Historian
Historical Collectors Series

Covered bridge over Wabash river at the foot
of Wabash Ave. Built in 1864, it was replaced
by present bridge in 1904.

The image used on this postcard is a reproduction of a much earlier postcard.

Old Wagon Bridge, Terre Haute, Ind.

This postcard, posted in Terre Haute on October 17th, 1910, has the printed text...

A-9958
Published Expressly for S. H. Knox & Co.
Made in U. S. A.

Old Wagon Bridge, Terre Haute, Ind.

This postcard, stamped in Chrisman, Illinois on March 3rd, 1913, has the printed text...

A-9958
Published Expressly for S. H. Knox & Co.
Made in U. S. A.

This page created 3rd August 2009, last modified 3rd January 2010