Friday, April 18, 2014

Greetings from Slingerlands?

A while back I purchased this intriguing postcard from eBay for a couple of bucks.


Greetings from Slingerlands, N. Y. it says.  Really?  Where in Slingerlands might this be?

Back in the day, Slingerlands was known as Normanskill.  By the mid 1800s it was beginning to be known as Slingerlands Corners.  Find yourself a map and trace the outline of the Normanskill (or Normans Kill or Norman's Kill - but that is a debate for another day) and you'll see that it is close to what we think of a Slingerlands today. McCormack Road used to be the main road from Albany, over the creek and into the hamlet.

So,maybe the river shown is the Normanskill; however I don't know of a location near Slingerlands with a road that parallels the creek like in the picture.  Pop over here http://docs.unh.edu/NY/alby50ne.jpg and look at the USGS map from 1950 and see what you think.

Maybe a part of Blessing Road - but the landscape just doesn't seem right.  My conclusion is that this is a stock image that the postcard manufacturer labeled as Slingerlands.

And if you are curious, the back of the card is shown below.  True collector's love postcards that were never used.  I prefer to wonder about the story of the person who mailed it and the person who received it.





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