June 7, 1909
Dear Basil,
Many thanks for P.P.C. to hand June 2. This appears to have been the first one to reach Sutton Coldfield and as a consequence the "Aston" family are extremely jealous. Bert is far more gone on the girls than he used to be in fact I think he is making himself too cheap. Mr.(?) Jones class* had another picnic on Whit-monday & we had a splendid time. I never enjoyed myself more. Your mother & sister are away at present as you probably know & Elsie Aston seems quite lost without Gladys. More later.
Oliver
* originally I thought this word was "clan", but a comment by Jean Belle suggested "class."
The message on the back of this postcard is dated June 7,
1909 and was written by Oliver to Basil. Even though there is a lot written on the back of the card, the
group, its location, and occasion are not actually identified. It seems
likely that the location is Sutton Coalfield. The group looks like
it could be a church group. There are about twice as many women as
men, and only a couple of children. The expressions on the faces are quite varied, though none of them look especially happy.
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Are We Having Fun Yet? |
Could this possibly be the splendid enjoyable picnic on Whit-monday?
Sutton Coalfield is a town that is a suburb of the city of Birmingham in the West Midlands of England. Historically in Warwickshire, it became part of Birmingham and the West Midlands metropolitan county in 1974. (source:
Wikipedia)
There are a number of old images and family photographs of Sutton Coldfield
here. This postcard of Sutton Park shown there is from the same era as the group photo. It looks like it would be a popular place for a picnic and a possible location for the group photo.
The verse written on this card is:
Along the path under the trees,
How they do each other squeeze,
If trees could talk tell tales they might,
Along this path on a Sunday night.
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