My friend Keith Sadler has amassed a substantial collection of vintage postcards promoting roadside art environments, grottos, rock gardens, attractions and oddities of all kinds. They include antique rarities, like the many Palais Idéal cards, lots of Real Postcard-style images, and a few relatively modern color cards.
This page presents a digitized library of these postcards, as well as some related snapshots and brochures. There’s also a bonus gallery of postcards showing the Asylum for Feeble-Minded Children in Lincoln, Illinois, the one-time residence of Henry Darger. Plus my own collection of vintage images of Miami’s magnificent Bottle Cap Inn environment.
Some of the cards show environments in early stages of their evolution, others provide multiple angles that may not have made it into more recent documentation. Of course some of these sites have vanished, or been mostly forgotten. And some are unidentified and unidentifiable, at least by me.
The galleries include the backs of cards when they contain even modestly relevant information. Many just reference the weather and travel plans. But some are more interesting, like the one referring to the “bum” responsible for a mud sculpture of the crucifixion, and many are useful in dating the postcard.
It took tremendous effort to assemble this collection. Now you can navigate it at your leisure. Enjoy!
Check out my celebration of many art environments.
I also recommend spacesarchives.org, the most exhaustive documentation of art environments anywhere.