Rensselaer Republican, Volume 14, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 January 1882 — The Postal Card. [ARTICLE]

The Postal Card.

A treatise on the history of the postal card has been published in Berlin. The originator of the idea is said to have been a German state official, Dr. Stephan, who wrote an essay upon in 1865. Austria was the first to adopt it, beginning in October, 1869. The first three months witnessed the passage of 2,930,000 cards through the mails. Germany followed suit in 1870, and, on the first day after the introduction of the Eostal card, 45,468 were sent off in Bern alone; and within two months over 2,600,000 were used. Other countries soon initiated the same step. During the Franco-Prussian war the postal card system was a great boon to both armies, Over 10,000,000 cards passed during the campaign between the German soldiers and their friends and homes. The greatest proportional consumption of postal cards occurs unquestionably in the United States. The whole of Europe is' estimated to use annually 350,000.000, while the consumption in the United States will probably not fall short of 230,000,000. Germany consumed in 1879122,747,000. The use of the postal card is,moreover, constantly increasing, and to some extent at the expense of the letter correspondence. There are now said to be seventy-three countries in which it is introduced. Austria, which has the honor of first putting the idea into practical execution,iS'now said to have cards of the poorest material and most inconvenient form. Headny’s chapel, a Methodist church six miles south of Spencer, was burned by incendiaries on Thursday last. Loss, $1,200; no insuraUce,