Arkansas

Seemed like I had a lot of postcards of Arkansas, but I guess I've already posted most of them. See here and here and here. You'd think I might have more, as my friend Carla is from there.

In any case, the Mystery Sender, as always, came through, and I have this postcard of the School of Medicine at the University of Arkansas. As the Mystery Sender says, this actual building may or may not still exist, but the school does and it is the only medical school in the state of Arkansas.

Homage to Mystery Sender, II

In my dive into the worlds of postcards, I've discovered that not only are there thousands and thousands of collectors, many of them limit their collections to very specific sub-categories: cowboy poetry, courthouses in Florida, Maps of Scottish Tartans, and malls of America, to name a few. It's really amazing. These postcards from the Mystery Sender could be grouped under the category, Architecture, with the subcategory, public buildings.

A fair number of the postcards sent by the Mystery Sender seem to feature locations in Arkansas. I see this as a red herring, or at minimum, random but not deliberate. A bit of a treat for my friend, Carla, who grew up in Arkansas and commented on yesterday's post that she had water skied growing up on the lake created by the Norfork Dam in the Ozarks, featured yesterday.

On one of these postcards is a url. A clue, perhaps? I went to the site, an ebay store (www.Dale Velk.com) which sells postcards, along with souvenir plates, collectors plates, high school yearbooks, ephemera and more. The specific link was to the postcard of the radio station, below. "Aha!" I thought. I sent Dale Velk an email, telling him the story of the mystery sender, and imploring him to send me the name or at least the initials of the person who had purchased this card. I received a reply back immediately, "Hi Mary i still have this postcard as far as I know. I don't recall any questions or emails about it. Good luck with your mystery!" Foiled again.

More tomorrow.

Homage to Mystery Sender

If you've been paying attention, you've noticed a couple of postings regarding the elusive mystery postcard sender, someone who has been sending unsigned postcards, dropping an occasional clue as to her/his identity, taunting me when I mis-read the clues, but continuing to send an array of antique postcards, almost daily.

I love getting these. The regularity is wonderful, I never know when there might be a taunt (which of course always makes me laugh), and the depth of random information on each postcard is extraordinary.

So for the next few days, I'll be featuring an "Homage to Mystery Sender", first with a couple groupings of cards, and finally with the taunts.

Several cards arrived which featured dams, roads, public buildings, etc. Others are decidedly un-PC for this day and age, and others illustrate a sense of humor that has long since passed.

Today, the dams. Pay particular attention to the additional info on the back of each. I find it all fascinating!

The Worst Hotel I Ever Stayed In

I was surprised to come across this postcard, from the “Absolute Worst Business Hotel I Ever Stayed In”. What possessed me to keep it (and not even mail it to myself) I’ll never know. Must be my predilection for postcards.

One of my advertising assignments was the launch of Chun King Frozen Oriental Entrees. As was often the case, a factory tour was part of the learning-about-the-product process. Chun King Entrees were one of many products manufactured at the world’s largest frozen food plant in Russellville, Arkansas.

Russellville, Arkansas is not easy to get to. First, fly to Little Rock, Arkansas – at the time an airport with only six gates. Then, rent a car and drive two+ hours to Russellville. It is definitely in the middle of nowhere.

I was traveling with my two clients, one senior to the other, but both men. When we arrived at 8 PM at the hotel where we were supposed to be staying, somehow there was no reservation for me. “No room at the inn”, was the message from the person at the front desk, “but there’s a motel down the road”. Rather than offering to double up, or even helping me look into it, my clients looked at me, handed me the keys to the rental car, instructed me to “be back at 8 AM”, and disappeared into their respective rooms.

My memory tells me I went to the car, drove down the road and into the parking lot of the motel, along with the semis and pick-ups, off the interstate. I remember being a bit uncomfortable as a young woman on her own, in a motel with doors facing the parking lot and flimsy windows opening onto the walkways. I stayed at cheap, dirty, questionable even sleazy hotels all over Latin America when I traveled there. But somehow I was flabbergasted that my clients gave not a moment’s thought to safety or security or even common courtesy on a business trip they had asked me to accompany them on.

It’s often a conflict – being treated like an equal in business and being seen as a woman. I can’t imagine that either of these men would be comfortable with their own wives being sent alone to a rural motel, in the dark, at night, in a place she'd never been. Can we have it both ways or is that asking too much? What do you think? Have you ever been in a situation like this?