Petercsák Tivadar: Várak és múzeumok - Studia Agriensia 29. (Eger, 2010)

Képeslevelezőlap-gyűjtemény Szerencsen

THE SZERENCS POSTCARD COLLECTION

The Szerencs Museum's collection of over 600,000 picture postcards is the only one of its kind in Hungary. It emerged initially out of the collection belonging to the dentist László Petrikovits, but increased substantially from 1967 with the addition of an example of each one of the picture postcards printed by the Képzőművészeti Alap Kiadóvállalata (Arts Foundation Publication Company).

The picture postcard, which first appeared in 1870-71, is not only a practical means of communicating, but a thing of considerable cultural historical importance on account of its illustrative content. The Szerencs collection consists mainly of street scenes, providing views of all Hungary's towns and villages from the end of the 19th century onwards. The postcards depicting theatrical scenes, and the dances and fashions associated with particular periods, are also of interest. The collection also includes postcard rarities, such as those made from reindeer skin, bark and Japanese silk, and the so-called collage cards. In the collection one can also find plenty of things of technical interest, such as the gramophone disk postcard dating from 1898.

Of greatest historical importance is the townscape collection, which provides an insight into how our urban environment has changed since the end of the 19th century. It is an invaluable resource for students of local history. In this study we look at the extent to which the local press can be used in studying settlement history in conjunction with the ten oldest postcards we have of Szerencs.

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