Advertising, Marketing and Image: Visual Representations and School Modernity through Postcards (Spain, the Twentieth Century)

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The concept of modernity, alone or in conjunction with the concepts of modern, modernization or modernism, is, as Le Goff (1991, pp. 145-173) showed, a polysemic, ambiguous, changing term with connotations that can imply praise, disapproval or may even be simply neutral. This polysemy and variety in time and place need to be seen in the widest complex of conflicts and struggles around the control of language—i.e. the imposition of one meaning or another on the word—, as well as to be related to the existence, or non existence, of an awareness at all times and in all places of being, or not, before a new time, and whether to define itself as modern. Lastly, there is the question of using this term to characterize others be they contemporary or previous in time (Koselleck, 1993, pp. 287-332). Thus, in a study of this caliber, it is necessary to state precisely which concept or idea of modernity is taken as the starting point, and what meaning is being attributed to the word.

Modernity can be considered from various approaches: artistic-esthetic (modernist style, modernist poetry); philosophical-rational (Enlightenment, critical reflection, instrumental rationality or that of action; reason versus religious-dogmatic authority); scientific (genesis of modern science); historical (the Modern Age); sociological (processes of modernization and secularization; whether fashionable or not, being or not being modern in one’s clothing, external appearance, customs, language, hobbies, likes, behavior or manners); economic-commercial (rationalization of production, advertising, marketing, merchandizing); technical and scientific (technology, mechanization, home electronic devices used in daily life and in the communication, production and transmission of knowledge) or educational-cultural (processes of literacy, schooling, feminization, professionalization of teachers and dissemination of written culture). Our choice of approach will determine the meaning, and we will find ourselves immersed in different periods, places and social groups. In this paper we will seek to avoid any judgmental connotation, be it laudatory (linking the idea of modernity with progress or modernization) or pejorative (as something insecure or uncertain that aims to destroy the traditional, in the sense of safe and of value), and will employ a triple technological, economic-commercial and sociological-cultural approach.

The approach is technological in that the analysis focuses on an object, the picture postcard, developed through the confluence of a series of innovations in the world of printing and production of images at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries. It is economic-commercial because this new object would be used by some educational institutions as an advertising tool to make themselves known and to attract, through images, certain students and families; or these institutions, as well as other public and private bodies, would use them as a way of advertising their actions and activities. The approach is sociological-cultural because the picture postcard was not just a privileged and widely used means of communication between persons and of transmitting socio-cultural values, in this case in the field of education and schooling, but using it was itself a statement of one’s desire to be up to date, to be modern by employing one of the visible signs of modernity—the printed image.

Given their ever broader dissemination thanks to the postal service, picture postcards were by the end of the nineteenth century and especially during the early twentieth century (their “golden age”) advertising tools that were used by businesses, and these included primary, secondary and professional schools (particularly those of religious orders and congregations), which would later be followed by groups of state schools built in those years, and also by education administration. In a manner of speaking they were a business or visiting card (be it as single picture postcards or as part of an album, rather like the souvenir postcards of cities and other places) of these educational institutions which used them to present families and society as a whole with the image or images by which they desired to be known. This article analyzes the general evolution in Spain of this sign of modernity and advertising tool which served to convey socio-cultural values and to create school identities, and it also examines the various uses made of it, the general norms followed and the diversity of social images offered by some educational establishments.

The various definitions or characterizations of the postcard as an object usually take into account its mounting, the content (not always) and its postal use or function. They do not, in the main, consider other uses, such as collectors’ items, commercial advertising, political propaganda, or their testimony, for example, to a person’s having been in a certain place. One example of such definitions is that put forward by Albert Thinlot in his history of the picture postcard in France: “printed matter on a semi-rigid support for postal use bearing a brief visible text” (Sánchez & Villena, 2010, p. 11). However, this definition is valid for both picture postcards and “plain postcards”, which began to circulate in the Austria-Hungary Empire on December 1st, 1869 (in Spain, private ones appeared in 1871 and official ones on December 1st, 1873), and bore no picture or illustration whatever. A simpler definition, and one that fits our purpose better, is that of Ado Kyrou (1966, p. 7): “a card, one of whose sides is for the purpose of correspondence and the other is illustrated”. However, this does not cover the earliest picture postcards whose front bore both a picture or an illustration, and also left a space for a written message, while the reverse side was exclusively for the details of the addressee. This “semi-occupation” of the front by a picture would change in 1906, when the picture displaced all written text to the reverse side of the card when the agreement adopted by the Universal Postal Union in 1905 which divided the reverse side into two halves came into effect, with one side for the address and the other for a written text. “As a result of this ‘liberation’, the pictures were able to grow until they occupied the whole front of the postcard”, or most of it, for they sometimes had a border or a space where the theme or content of the picture was proffered: “there is a before and after 1906 in the production of picture postcards” (Riego, 1997, p. 24). In short, this paper deals with picture postcards with school or educational content which contain one or more pictures on the front, which are sometimes accompanied by a short printed text that alludes to the picture or pictures and, only in the earliest versions, a space for a written text, while on the reverse side there is a specific space set aside for franking, another for a written message, the addressee’s details and, on occasions, some succinct information about the printer’s, the photographer, the content of the picture or pictures on the front of the card, or even, from the 1960s, the statutory deposit.

As Bernardo Riego has described, the picture postcard appeared at the end of the nineteenth century as a result of the confluence and interaction of three elements:

a postal exchange system organized by States that normalized and facilitated its legal social dissemination; a shared code of international scope that understood printed images as a vehicle for the transmission of cultural values; and, finally, the technological development in printing had enabled the mass reproduction of images photomechanically at a low cost. These three premises date from the twentieth century, when the necessary steps were taken that would lead to the birth of the picture postcard. It was to be a characteristic product of our century [twentieth century]; however, it did not appear out of nothing, but was due to the norms of cultural sociability that had been hatched earlier among the bourgeoisie. (1997, p. 22)

Indeed, although by the second half of the nineteenth century the collections or albums of photographs and business cards of diverse themes, along with woodblock printing in the printed illustrations had already generated the idea of a universal museum that reflected the world through pictures, it was with the arrival, during that period, of the phototype, the photoengraving and the rotogravure that an awareness that this idea was technically possible was born, and it would spread to the middle and working classes. After the phototype and the photo-chromotype came the postcards produced using gelatin bromide, between 1897 and 1900, with their shiny surfaces. These were true photographs “adapted to the form, size and other characteristics of the postcards”, and they would become widespread and commercialized from 1905 (Roig, n.d., p. 14).

The second element was the use of the cards as a postal object. There are various theories regarding the origins and the first specimens of postcards. Brady (1969, pp. 848-849), for example, alludes to the first private postcards, accepted as postal items in the United states in 1861 and even to earlier examples from France and England, dating back to the late eighteenth and mid nineteenth centuries. However, it is widely held that the first official postcards appeared in an issue of 140,000 postcards in Vienna in 1869: they measured 12 x 8 cm. and bore the effigy of the Emperor Franz Josef. They were quick to catch on elsewhere: Hungary (1869), the two German Confederations, the United Kingdom, Switzerland and Luxemburg (1870), Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Canada (1871) Russia, Chile and France (1872), and the USA, Italy, Spain, Romania, Serbia and Japan (1873) were all immediate adopters of this new postal device that catered for brief messages at a cheaper postal rate than that of a letter. Their circulation was to change from being merely domestic to international in 1875.

There was also a growing need to internationalize and normalize international mail and this led to the creation of the General Postal Union in 1874, which in 1878 would be renamed the Universal Postal Union. It was in that year that it normalized the postcard in terms of dimensions (14 x 9 cm.), franking, printed features and conditions of international exchange. This also served to foster a practice that had already begun to spread into private education for advertising or purely commercial purposes.

The inclusion on the front of an illustration of some nature or another which, prior to 1906 occupied just a part of it would not tarry. The first picture postcards were produced in Germany in 1870 by the lithographer Miesler. By 1871, postcards illustrated by a German engraver from Nuremberg were already circulating in Switzerland. In March 1872, a German artist, Franz Borich, reproduced his drawings on cards and, in the light of their success, contracted photographers and used phototypography to produce postcards showing Swiss scenery. The exhibitions in the last quarter of the nineteenth century—Dusseldorf, 1880; Halle, 1881; Nuremberg, 1882; Amsterdam, 1883—and, especially the Paris Universal Exposition of 1889 with its views of the Eiffel Tower, taken from gravure prints by Libonis and published in Le Figaro, would suppose “the great springboard for the picture postcard” (González & Torcida, 1997, p. 119). The first picture postcards were lithographic prints with several vignettes with drawings of views and monuments and the legend “Gruss Aus”—the German for “Greetings from”—followed by the name of the town or city. The huge success enjoyed by this format in Germanic countries led to its spreading to other countries, with the legend being translated or adapted accordingly (González & Torcida, 1997, p. 119).

Thus, a new product whose aim was first and foremost to communicate brief texts of a commercial nature and at a reasonable price had arrived, and was, progressively, to become an open means of cultural communication between individuals of all manner of subjects. Potentially, at least, the front of the postcard would be able to contain anything whatsoever: the sights of a city (monuments, buildings, streets, markets, churches, ports, stations, convents,…); spectacles and events (carnivals, fiestas, fairs, processions, bullfights,…); pictures of museum articles (paintings, sculptures); tourist areas, countrysides; portraits of monarchs and political figures, figures from literature, sport, actors, actresses singers, bulls, etc. These could be figures from the past or from the present. There were also scenes from the world of work and from daily life, some of them specifically conceived and recreated to appear on postcards. There were postcards of extraordinary events (exhibitions, accidents, floods, royal visits, fairs, social movements and the like). Then there were typical scenes of customs and traditions, artistic cards, commercial cards, propaganda cards, erotic, childish, romantic, satirical, humorous cards, cards conveying Christmas wishes, cards of wars and battles, in fact there were cards for almost anything (Guereña, 2005, pp. 46-58). A whole universe of images taken from the real world or drawing on the imagination could, finally, be produced, disseminated, sent, exchanged and collected. The title of Andrea Rapisarda’s book, Il mondo in cartolina, 1898-1918 [The world in postcards, 1898-1918] (1983), reflects perfectly the, in theory unlimited, thematic diversity and the new awareness of having the whole world within one’s reach from the comfort of one’s own home, either as a collector or simply as the owner or receiver of picture postcards.

Yet, “as occurs with any technical product, once the postcard outgrew its specialized area of commercial communication”, it moved into “new social uses” and redefined “existing ones” (Riego, 1997, p. 25). In the words of Boris Kossoy, its arrival

represented a real revolution in the history of culture. The mental images of the so-called real world and those of the individual and collective fantasy universe were finally made available to the masses. This portable, abundantly illustrated world was a prime candidate for collections with its endless stream of subjects and would finally satiate the public’s imaginarium. (2014, p. 181)

In 1899, 30 years after their appearance, and just a year before the dawn of their “golden age”, 88 million postcards were printed in Germany, 14 million in United Kingdom, 12 million in Belgium and 8 million in France. Eleven years later, in 1910, the number for France had soared to 123 million. Their popularity grew with the arrival of deltiology and with it, the birth of specialized clubs and magazines, especially in the early twentieth century (Kyrou, 1966, pp. 9-13, with the emphasis on France). As Brady states,

In some European countries (…) postcards had already become the subject of a wild collecting craze; it was the fashion to amass postcards of diverse types, and clubs and societies were formed which enabled their members to exchange cards. Postcards were on sale everywhere. In Germany, for instance, it was commonplace in cafés and restaurants to see a postman, with a mail box strapped to his back, moving among the tables, selling postcards and stamps—which could be posted immediately in his box. Exhibitions of picture postcards were organized. The first was held in Venice in 1899 and others were staged later in Nice, Ostend, Berlin and Paris. A Cartophilic Congress was convened in Prague—the name being coined to describe the new hobby. A rejected alternative name was “Cartomania”, but it is arguable that it might have been a better description of what was going on. (1969 p. 851)

There seems to be a widely accepted agreement that this “golden age” began in 1899-1900. For example, Kyrou (1966, p. 11) opts for it to have coincided with the Paris Universal Exposition of 1900, the same year as the first postcard exhibition was held, also in France. Where opinions differ, however, is when it ended, because, among other reasons, this depends on the qualitative or thematic-qualitative employed. For Brady, who limits the duration of the “golden age” to the first two decades of the twentieth century,

During the First World War censorship problems and rising postal costs, among other factors, contributed to a diminution of public demand and the development of new communication systems, such as the telephone, encouraged the continuation of a declining trend. By 1948-49 the inland mails carried 216 millions cards—only a quarter of the peak demand of earlier years but still a formidable source of postal revenue. (1969, p. 855)

In Spain, there are those who fix its ending in 1905 (Teixidor, 1999, pp. 11-15), others who see it as extending until the outbreak of World War I in 1914, and still others who prolong it until 1931 or even 1936. In the case in question here of postcards whose subject was schools, we would provisionally hypothesize still later dates given the high number of albums, wallets and separate postcards whose theme was educational institutions that abounded in the 1940s and 50s.

The first picture postcards related to Spain are, it seems, two photypes of Granada produced in Germany in 1890. Two thousand were printed but the whereabouts of them all is today unknown. The first known ones were printed by Hauser & Menet, a printers’ house set up in Madrid in 1890, and are postmarked 1892. They already bear the classic “Souvenir of Madrid” wording and four photographs on the front: the bullring, the San Jerónimo street, the “Puerta del Sol” and the Alcalá Street. Another candidate for the first “Spanish” picture postcard is one printed in Zurich which portrays the Hotel Santa Catalina in Las Palmas, of which there are examples postmarked between 1892 and 1895 (Teixidor, 1992, pp. 9-10, 1999, p. 11). Whichever of the two, 1892 is for the moment the year in which the first known “Spanish” picture postcard seems to have appeared, although we cannot discard a hypothetical date of 1890 or 1891.

Hauser & Menet, which produced 40% of the picture postcards printed in Spain in the nineteenth century, and which in 1892 sold just 200, had by 1902 amassed a collection of 1,300 different cards and a production that never dropped below 500,000 a month. By the turn of the century there were nearly 150 printing houses in Spain, or abroad but with postcards referring to Spain, that were printing, publishing and selling picture postcards, some of which were not for public use. An outstanding example from 1905 in Barcelona was Ángel Toldrá Viazo (A.T.V.) (Boix, 2002). From 1906 to 1915 this technologically state-of-the-art industrial sector had become fully consolidated (Sánchez & Villena, 2010, p. 32; Teixidor, 1999, pp. 15-23). Well known photographers would also become associated. In some cases, for example, that of the Madrid-based Lacoste & Co., this was because they considered themselves the successors of Jean Laurent, the Queen’s photographer from 1861 to 1868, and of his photographic collections which were sold as business cards (Pérez, 2015, pp. 270-290), while in others, like Antonio Cánovas del Castillo (“Kaulak”), it was because of the publication of some of his photographic compositions in the form of postcards with the help of printers like Lacoste & Co. and Hauser & Menet. For example, there was the collection of ten postcards on Las Doloras by the poet Ramón de Campoamor, which sold 180,000 collections, or 1,800,000 postcards in Spain and Latin America (Los editores, 1905, pp. 9-10).

Figure 1
Hauser & Menet advertis­ing inserted in the Boletín de la Tar­jeta Postal Ilustrada (December, 1902)
The generation of deltiology magazines and clubs would ac­company this movement. 1901 saw the birth of the Boletín de la Tarjeta Postal Ilustrada, followed by the Boletín Cartófilo Artístico-Literario (Barcelona), El Coleccionista de Tar­jetas Postales (Madrid) and España Cartófila (Barcelona) the magazine of the Spanish Deltiology Society (“Hispania”) which in 1902 boast-ed over 300 members, and 1906 witnessed the arrival of El Mundo Cartófilo (Valencia) from the Deltiology Club known as “La Ideal”.

Figure 2
Front cover of the magazine España Cartófila (1901)
The earliest reliable statistics on the number of postcards in circulation in the Spanish postal system refer to the period 1910-1919. Table 1, which is our own and is drawn up from an official publication, shows the growth from the 15,563,110 postcards in 1910 to the 18,605,033 in 1919, and the total number in circulation in those ten years, which reached 172,642,716. The figures also reflect the negative effects of the Great War, especially in terms of international circulation—cards received from or sent to other countries—with the domestic circulation doubling over the course of the decade, rising from 8,834,698 in 1910 to 15,143,324 in 1919. These figures were lower in any case per number of inhabitants for the same years than those of France, Germany or the United Kingdom, although, from our own calculations based on the official statistics yearbooks, they were to rise to 24,742,273 postcards in 1933—18,037,079 in domestic circulation and 6,705,194 internationally. After the negative effects of the Second World War, the social and economic stagnation and the ensuing international isolation during the first fifteen years of the Franco regime, the later economic growth and the progressive opening up of Spain saw the numbers rise to 58,809,160 in 1960—48,740,420 in domestic circulation and 10,068,740 internationally—and, in 1969, to 179,995,000, of which 156,383,000 were in domestic circulation and 23,612,000 international.

Table 1
Postcards in Circulation in Spain (1910-1919)
Source: Own, drawn from data provided by the Dirección General de Correos y Telégrafos [Spanish Postal and Telegraph Head Office] in Los servicios de correos en España. Su estado actual y proyecto de ampliación y mejora de los mismos, Madrid, Artes Gráficas “MATEV”, 1920. Observations: a) the figures for 1920 are not included as they are clearly incomplete; b) the data provided by this source usually pertain only to the number of postcards managed by the postal service; c) the international figures refer to postcards sent and received from abroad; d) information on in transit postcards is not given, which, in any case, only became available from 1915.

Broadly speaking, those who developed or commissioned this “shop window” of a country that picture postcards provided were those who determined what was “best and most representative” of it, what could and should be made visible to all and, at the same time therefore, what should not or did not deserve to be disseminated through images (Riego, 1997, p. 27). The willingness or desire to choose some subjects rather than others for commercialization and diffusion reflected certain cultural values. Thus, in the Spain of the beginning of the twentieth century there were those holding a cosmopolitan view of the picture postcard who saw it as a new “means of propagating civilization and fraternity between peoples” (Bassagoda, 1904), while others, whose chauvinist mindset, proper to the regenerationalist nationalism in Spain at the time, saw in the picture postcard an opportunity to show the world the country’s monuments, scenery and customs (L. B., 1901, p. 32). Then there were others, supporters of more regional nationalisms, who shared similar aims and who used the picture postcard, as occurred in the 1920s and 30s with the Catalan Associació Protectora de l’Ensenyança, which displayed the monuments, urban and country sights, customs and the like that were most emblematic of Catalonia. There were those, too, who sought to show off their educational and cultural values:

the postage stamp shows, with no feeling, the political geography; the picture postcard reveals it even better, because it does not limit itself to the name of a country, its monarch or head of state and to a type of currency, but it expands into the description of cities and landscapes, of monuments and customs, it popularizes and makes available to rich and poor and to people of all persuasions alike what was hitherto the exclusive privilege of books. (Cánovas del Castillo, 1901, p. 2)

It was even to become a teaching tool in primary and secondary education and a trusted method of regenerating Spain:

What foreign texts might one cite to demonstrate that in Switzerland, Germany and in other countries which are widely held to march at the forefront of civilization, there is a fostering of enthusiasm among schoolchildren to learn political and physical geography and to accustom them in the contemplation of works of art from all countries? Truly, one does not teach only through books, but through other means too, which while apparently insignificant, at times yield better results (…).

I finish, therefore, by saying that postcards are called on to play a part in the regeneration of Spain, and, in faith, it is better that we achieve this in such a gentle and pleasant manner. (J. P., 1901, p. 50)

Of course, the picture postcard would also be used as a means of propaganda in order to project certain political ideas or to make people considered to be of cultural, political or ideological relevance better known. Here are a few examples, of an educational-cultural nature, included in the collection of postcards of the “Centro de Estudios sobre la Memoria Educativa” (CEME) of the University of Murcia: Tolstoy, Schiller, Kant, Goethe’s garden, Goethe-Schiller, Diderot, Jules Simon, Goethe and especially Pestalozzi among the foreigners, while Spaniards represented included Joaquín Costa, Manuel Bartolomé Cossío, Francisco Ferrer Guardia, Marcelino Menéndez Pelayo and Jaime Balmes, or the statue in Madrid to Claudio Moyano, the minister responsible for the Public Instruction Act of 1857. There were even series of cards with unquestionable ideological aims, as was the case of the eight series published from 1931 by the journal Estudios, which had an anarchist slant. Each series comprised twelve figures: “a philosopher, a poet, an artist, a revolutionary, a sculptor, a musician, an inventor, a pioneer, a discoverer, a great novelist, a writer and a pedagogue”, among the last were to be found Pestalozzi, Giner de los Ríos, Ellen Key, Claparède, Rousseau and Desmoulins. All this was done with

the noble purpose of disseminating and stimulating a love of study, and not to contribute to any type of idolatry. We simply wish that each person, when beholding these men who have stood out for their useful and fertile labors in the revolution of human thought, feels the desire to know more about their lives and to study their works. (Almarcha, 2009, pp. 42-43)

The picture postcard is a means of interpersonal expression and communication; a means which, as has been said, reflects, or is, the product of certain social and cultural values which it reinforces and memorializes. In our case, the educational institutions, or their patrons or the entities on which they depend, aware of the creative and productive function picture postcards had for memory, began to commission the production of albums or postcards with the express idea of preserving, creating and constructing memory. Resorting to mottos such as “Souvenir from…”, sometimes printed on the front cover of the album much in the manner of the wording used on those of cities or certain places, were a sign of the link between card-image and memory.

Whether expressly stated or not, this recordatory desire demanded that any educational institution that used this new tool first commissioned from a printers’ and from a specific photographer some specific images of itself, and not others, that conveyed the image it wished to offer and create. Picture postcards thus became an element that made up the individual and social image-memory of the institution to which they referred. They acted as a visiting card and a presentation in society. They showed how the institution wished to be seen, visualized and remembered socially. The edition of booklets and wallets with a specific number of postcards, or loose postcards, presupposed a specific desire to influence and condition the social image-memory of the institution. Likewise, the selection of the images reflected a specific conception to be presented to society. Any study of these postcards must, therefore, bear in mind:

• · The purpose behind the desire to publish images.

  · The choice of images in each case.

  · The formation of some norm for the common places to be shown and the order in which to show them, which was widely adopted by the educational institutions and the printing houses.

  · The differences in the choice and order of the album or wallet according to the type of institution—formal or welfare education, the level of education, whether it was state or private, for boys or for girls, etc. or the purpose for which a series of pictures was commissioned.

  · All of these in relation to the various stakeholders in the process: the commissioners—in this case, the educational establishment or its owners; the producer—the printing house; the photographer; and those who acquired and used them for whatever purpose—postal correspondence, collecting, souvenir, etc.

As regards the commissioning, production and use, postcards, both plain and, especially, picture postcards, were used as a means of advertising and for propaganda almost from the very outset. Among the publishers related to the world of teaching, Bastinos in 1873 and Calleja in 1902 would use this advertising tool (Carrasco, 2004, p. 15, 2013, p. 31). There were six facts or aspects, listed below, that explain why teaching centers commissioned booklets or wallets with separate cards that either unfolded or were loose, for recordatory purposes, of course, but also for advertising, propaganda and marketing—especially early on by religious schools, but soon after by other welfare teaching establishments, school camps and state schools.

Figure 3
Picture postcard from the Calleja publishing house (c. 1902)

The first is the hypothesis that in more than one case the commissioners were schools of religious orders or congregations whose members hailed from France—Brothers if the Christian Schools or Lasallians, the Company of Maria or Marianists—fleeing the anti-congregationalist laws of Waldeck-Rousseau (1901) and Combes (1902), or those whose origins were in that country where the practice was already used and known. Thus, for example, the first postcards from the Lasallian School “Nuestra Señora de la Bonanova”, in Barcelona, dated 1902-1903, were commissioned by its director, Brother Adolf Alfred, who was of French origin, from the printer A. Berger Frères de París (Hill, 2009, p. 13). Or that the three well known postcards if the Madrid “Collège du Sacré-Coeur de Jésus”, run by the Daughters of Charity, a congregation of French origin, were produced until 1904 in Paris by David from photographs of Levallois (Carrasco, 2013, p. 53). From a broader perspective, were this to be confirmed, this would be just another case of transfer, an import, of a practice already in use in teaching establishments, generally private, in other European countries. A proof of this transfer is that among the first picture postcards printed by Hauser and Menet, a Madrid editor of picture cards, here are two, dated 1898 and 1902, from the school “El Porvenir”, built between 1892 and 1897 by the German Evangelist pastor Federico Fliedner, and another of the evangelist chapel and schools in the Madrid quarter of Chamberí, which were built by English pastors (Carrasco, 2013, pp. 52, 67). Similarly, as regards Barcelona, the first albums of picture postcards were commissioned by the Lasallian Brothers (the recently mentioned school “Nuestra Señora de la Bonanova” in 1902-1903 and the “Condal” school in 1907) and the girls’ schools, as well as by congregations of French origins, by the nuns of “Jesús-María” and from “Nuestra Señora de Loreto”. All these would then be quickly followed by the Jesuit schools and the Piarist schools and the Congregation of Mary in Barcelona (Boix, 2002, pp. 577-628, 645-654).

The second is that once the practice had been introduced, there was little choice but to follow it for its symbolic prestige and its success on the “market” of potential school customers.

The third was that it was an indirect and subtle way of advertising. Obviously nobody said openly that the commissioning and production of the picture postcards were for motives of advertising or publicity, rather they were to serve as a souvenir for the students who could use them, instead of a letter, to communicate with their friends and families, although, of course, they would also be used by the staff and directors and even owners of the establishment. The educational center therefore had its own “captive audience”, which was more or less forced into using its postcards. Of course, the booklets, wallets and loose postcards could also serve as gifts, at opportune moments, to the students, authorities, visitors, families or they could even be purchased by the last of these so that they could show or contemplate in their own homes the places where their offspring were studying or living. In one way or another, as Albert Hill concludes in his two articles on the four “ancient” albums or series of postcards from 1902-1903, 1908, 1914 and 1920, and the five “old” albums or series from the 1930s, 1942 and 1956, from the school “Nuestra Señora de la Bonanova” in Barcelona, the printers of these school postcards “were commissioned to produce them as images that served to advertise the centre” (Hill, 2014, p. 33). Likewise, the album containing 20 postcards of the “Colegio Cántabro” in Santander, published between 1924 and 1930, is, without any qualms at all, included by Manuela Alonso Laza among the “advertising postcards” together with those of “businesses, hotels, restaurants and a long etcetera of buildings devoted to trade and tourism” or institutions like the “Valdecilla” hospital or the “Menéndez Pelayo” library (Alonso, 1997, p. 80).

The fourth aspect is the result of the confluence of the recordatory function of the postcards with the configuration or reinforcement of a feeling or sense of belonging to an educational institution which is materialized in certain images that will evoke the memory of this. It is not so much the current students who are identifying themselves with the institution, although this is also true, but rather the former students. It is one more tool in the wider context of a series of devices like school associations, sports teams, community acts, ex alumni associations, uniforms or garments, hymns and songs, etc., that are all aimed at creating and evoking feelings and emotions associated with membership of a clearly defined school with its own history and tradition.

The fifth aspect is closely knitted to content or subject matter of first picture postcards issued in Spain, or about Spain, at the end of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Indeed, a review of these reveals how among the emblematic or historical buildings deemed worthy of being reproduced were, along with those of cultural standing (the Prado Museum, the National Library, the Alcalá General Archives, the Archives of Simancas), welfare education (hospices, foundling homes), some scientific buildings (the Astronomical Observatory, the Metereological Institute), the ancient universities and university colleges (Salamanca, Valladolid, Santiago, Alcalá de Henares, Barcelona, Oviedo, Valencia), some faculties (Medicine in Barcelona and Saragossa), secondary schools (“Jovellanos” in Gijón), academies and schools of engineers or the army (Guadalajara, Madrid, Bilbao, Valladolid), music schools (the municipal school in Barcelona), ecclesiastical seminaries (Oviedo, Santiago, Lérida), private universities (the Jesuit University of Deusto), colleges of religious orders and congregations (the Jesuits of Barcelona, Valladolid, La Guardia and El Puerto de Santa María, “Sagrado Corazón” in San Sebastián, the El Escorial School of Higher Studies), and the state schools built by Indian immigrants like the primary and secondary schools in Guarda (La Coruña). In other words, with no direct attempt at seeking publicity or fame, the very nature of the product leads to a variety of teaching centers and establishments that were deemed meritorious of forming part of that set of monuments or emblematic buildings that should be reproduced in the series of postcards of one city or another. Once the road had been opened there was no stopping the tide of teaching institutions that incorporated the picture postcard into the advertising strategies to announce their prestige.

Figure 4
Jesuit University of Deusto. Main façade (1902)

The sixth, and last, aspect to consider is that of the picture postcard as a sign of modernity and adaptation to the “latest trend” and to the preferences of the well-off classes, as an additional feature in a general context of educational modernization of Catholic orders and congregations (Dávila & Naya, 2012; Fullana & Ostolaza, 2007; Kössler, 2009). The postcard “is a product that symbolizes that modern time like none” (Riego, 2011, p. 14). It was the time of the cinematographer, born in 1895, of “amateur photography”, thanks especially to the launch in 1888 of the Kodak camera with its “You press the button. We do the rest”, and of the illustrated magazines. In short, the age of “a society stimulated by new images with new mountings and a society that also collected picture postcards that covered almost every imaginable theme” (Riego, 2011, p. 13). Besides, in the case of the Catholic orders and congregations, the pictures selected offered these social classes not only technological-cultural modernity in terms of the product, but also monumentality, catholicity—chapels, religious images, architecture with religious echoes—, information about the everyday inhabited areas—dormitories, bathrooms, refectories, kitchen, medical dispensary, etc.—, and the new, and therefore modern, educational installations— libraries, natural history museums, laboratories, sports fields, etc.—; in short social and scholarly distinction.

In another paper (Viñao & Martínez, 2016) we carry out a provisional typology of picture postcards of educational or school themes, in which we outline, at the end, some of the singular aspects that need to be taken into account when analyzing the albums or wallets of certain teaching centers commissioned by their directors or owners.

Postcards that make up booklets or parts of wallets form a set of postcards of an educational establishment—in a broad sense that includes school camps and cradle homes. These could be of the type that unfold into a chain of postcards or in a booklet with perforations on the left hand side, or simply stored separately, or not, in a wallet. The postcards bear a brief reference to the picture and, in general, follow a set order regardless of whether they are numbered or not.

The content and order of booklets and wallets of postcards, the elements and the arrangement of these in a “shop window” or “display case” reflect the aims of the entity or persons commissioning the product, the conception that they wish to offer of the teaching centre, its nature (religious-private, lay-private, state, welfare education; teaching level or modality; target audience; type of students in terms of sex or social group; etc.), and a specific idea as to how to relate what one wishes to relate, be it in selected images or through the order and arrangement of the postcards. In short, how the “shop window” or “display case” is presented will provide one representation or another in the individual and social souvenir imaginarium.

The first booklets and wallets of postcards were produced under commission of the owners or directors of educational institutions and pertain to Catholic orders or congregations. They are three printed collections from Hauser and Menet: two in 1901—ten postcards—and 1903—nine—about the Jesuit secondary school “Nuestra Señora del Recuerdo”, or “Chamartín”, in Madrid, and another published around 1904, with ten postcards of the “Colegio Comercial Nuestra Señora de las Maravillas” (Madrid) belonging to the Sisters of Christian Schools (Carrasco, 2013, pp. 51-52), plus the already cited collection published in Paris by A. Berger Frères 1902-1903, commissioned by the “Nuestra Señora de la Bonanova” school of Barcelona and containing twenty postcards (Hill, 2009, pp. 13-16). Their content, with some variations, would lay down the norms regarding how to present oneself in society through selected images, aspects of their contents, order of presentation, and therefore should be viewed.

The order invited the beholder of the collection to enter the establishment from the outside and then move around the various rooms and spaces inside. The early postcards offered first a general view of the building or the main entrance area, the façade or other angles worth contemplating. They then showed the entrance itself or the hall and the visitors’ room. These were followed by the chapel, the dormitories, the bathrooms, the refectory, the library, the natural history museum and the study room, before ending with the gardens. As an example, we can take the contents of two albums, the first incomplete:

• · “Colegio Comercial de Ntra. Sra. de la Bonanova” (Barcelona, 1902-1903): 1. Entrance Gate. 2. Avenue and driveway. 3.?. 4. Magnolia Patio. 5. Main façade. 6. Hall.7. Arcade in the hall. 8. The Corridor of St. John the Baptist of La Salle. 9. Entrance to the main staircase. 10. Reception room. 11. Kitchens. 12. Refectory of the 1st Division. 13. ?. 14. A study room. 15. Part of the museum. 16. Playground and rear façade. 17. Rear tower. 18. Dormitories of the 1st Section. 19. Washroom. 20. Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes.

  · “Colegio Comercial de Ntra. Sra. de las Maravillas” (Madrid, c. 1904): 1. Main façade. 2. Main entrance. 3. Hall. 4. Visitors’ room. 5. Chapel. 6. Dormitories of the 2nd section. 7. One of the refectories. 8. Outside view of the chapel. 9. Detail of the park. 10. Rear façade of the gardens.

When the booklet or wallet was generalized to 20 postcards, this norm allowed for some variations: sometimes the chapel and other religious elements would gain more relevance; on other occasions it would be the complementary services that might appeal to the families of the boarders that were highlighted—the dorms, bathrooms, refectory, kitchens, gardens, play areas; or maybe the historical features of the building or buildings. However, this initial norm had two distinguishing features that would, with time, be corrected in some cases: the absence or near absence of the classrooms, the students and the teachers. There are no classrooms, and if there are, they are generally empty, and there are no teachers or pupils, other than a handful if the latter and in the recreational areas and gardens.

Regardless of the content, one should not discard the influence of the recently arrived cinematograph and what was presented as “a type of animated photographs that creates new narrative norms in the scenes which (…) are translated into the format of the postcard booklet” (Riego, 1997, p. 37). It is a format that is closely “related to the idea of cinematographic sequence. It was a kind of visual tour of a specific area based on individual shots that make up the whole” (Riego, 2011, p. 11). And, of course, there was also the new way of looking at things that the railways were providing. In the words of Manuela Alonso (1997, pp. 74-75), when referring to the postcard booklets on Santander, “the booklet works as if it were a railway line. The passenger sees the main sights of Santander go by: from the station where he arrives, to the next station, situated in the most touristic part: El Sardinero”.

Similarly, the booklet or wallet of an educational establishment transported the viewer from the outside—the general view of the school or the main façade—through the entrance and hall to the gardens of the same. Then, after being welcomed in the visitors’ room, the visitor was shown the other rooms inside the building, before being taken outside into the park or gardens again. And there the visit ended, as did the narrative of the school which had used images in order to “imaginarily” absorb the viewer during his or her successive contemplations of the postcards.

This order or norm was not always adhered to, though. The nature of the teaching center and the view it sought to offer of itself would affect both the norm and the order. Thus, in two sets of postcards of the schools of “Ave María” in Granada, produced between 1914 and 1921, the order followed constituted a narrative, first on the history of the schools: the sets open with two photographs taken in 1888 and 1889 that show, respectively, the caves where the gypsy students lived and the “carmen” (it seems from the Hebrew “Karmel” for “garden” or the Arab “Karm” for “vineyard”) or building and place to which they were taken, along with the founder figure, Father Manjón, before moving on to the activities performed during a normal school day, from the arrival in the morning to departure in the afternoon, with special attention given to methodology used in teaching some of the subjects—reading and writing, geography, music, …—and, obviously, there was an ample presence of pupils and even a teacher. Immersing oneself in the sets means not only journeying through the history of the founding of the school, but also getting a sight of a complete school day. In contrast to the cold, timeless, static and monumental presence of the façades or the impersonal rooms and gardens, we are offered here a historical account that includes human beings. In contrast to the fragmented space of the norm or the booklet, what these collections do is to fragment time, or if you prefer, they offer fragments of space, which as Bachelard (1965, p. 38) puts it, “they preserve compressed time”.

Figure 5
Country schools of the “Ave María” (Granada). “Various ‘Carmens’ were swiftly occu­pied and schools were built in them”

Other variations relate to the greater or lesser use made of this advertising resource. The most outstanding case, for the high number (nine) of collections commissioned between 1902 y 1956 and a total of 257 postcards printed, is clearly the “Nuestra Señora de la Bonanova” school in Barcelona of the Brothers of Christian Schools. This was a paradigmatic case of resorting of the image for advertising purposes, taking into consideration the production of some photograph album, with identical purposes, and the abundance of these in the annual reports.

Figure 6
“Nuestra Señora de la Bonanova” school in Barcelona. Large photograph album measuring 29,8 x 23,4 cm. and two booklets of postcards (c. 1930)

While some of the collections met the norm cited, albeit with some variations, others followed completely different criteria. Some focused entirely on a festival of physical education—the issue of 1908 with 35 postcards, on the higher classes in the school—an issue of the 1930s with 17 postcards—with a logical abundance in both cases of pupils and also of families (at the festival). Another issue related to the Natural History Museum. Published in 1920, it contained 20 postcards. In other cases there were high numbers of postcards—55 in the collection of 1914—so giving a far more exhaustive and detailed view of all aspects of the school. Finally, some of the issues were of a lesser nature; that of 1956 had just six postcards which sought to publicize improvements that had been made to the school’s infrastructures, especially in the field of physical education and in particular to the gymnasium, just one year after Barcelona had hosted the II Mediterranean Games, when the famous Spanish gymnast, Joaquín Blume was at the pinnacle of his career and the height of his fame—he would win the individual European Championship the next year (Hill, 2009, 2014).

We began by stating that “modernity” is a polysemic, ambiguous and changing concept, whose meaning and scope can only be established in relation to its use in specific contexts, in relation to certain spaces, times, situations and actors. The fact that some educational establishments in the Spain of the early twentieth century—the “golden age” of the postcard—resorted to a commercial product for personal and cultural intercommunication like the picture postcard as a means of presenting themselves to society, as a way of advertising, of creating identities and subjectivities and of building their social imaginarium was firm proof of their being up to date and of the “modern” education that they offered. The commissioning of booklets or wallets of the school or of specific activities carried put in it pointed to a threefold modernity—technological, economic-commercial and sociological cultural. It was a display of modernity and social distinction that targeted a specific audience and families.

That this same modernity was used to attain traditional, safe, stable aims that were held in high esteem (the Catholic education of specific social groups) shows the capacity of the picture postcard to adapt to a specific context and also reveals a combination, in the school world, of traditional ideology and technological, economic and socio-cultural modernity. In other words, it shows the ambiguity of the very concept of modernity and the coexistence of traditional and modern elements in the specific application of that concept, especially when the latter pertain to the external appearance adopted and presented to society. The practice spread and was taken on by more private schools, in the main belonging to Catholic orders and congregations, but also by a few state schools, welfare education institutions and school camps; it offers yet more evidence of the propagandistic and advertising power of the product, and also of the need to make use of it if one wanted to appear “modern”. What would we think today of a school or a cultural or educational institution that did not have its own website?

This paper is part of Research Project EDU2013-42040-P, entitled “Imagen y educación: marketing, comercialización, didáctica (España, siglo XX)”, financed by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness. Translation: Stephen Hasler