“Bill Bailey” Real Photo Postcard Theme in Blackface Tradition

Item Details

A real photo postcard (RPPC) published by Bamforth & Co. of Holmfirth, England, dated in ink 1910. This card is part of a transatlantic tradition of comic postcards that trafficked in dehumanizing blackface stereotypes, often drawing on American minstrel music and stage routines.

The photo depicts a staged scene: a woman in headwrap and apron stands at a laundry line “weeping hard,” while a man peers out from a Dutch door above. Both are costumed in theatrical blackface, their exaggerated expressions and gestures conforming to racist visual tropes common in popular entertainment of the era. Beneath the image is a verse modeled after the well-known coon song Bill Bailey, Won’t You Please Come Home:

On one Summer day, sun was shining fine,

The lady love of old Bill Bailey was hanging clothes on de line,

In her back yard and weeping hard.

While this card was marketed as humorous in its time, it now stands as a stark artifact of the ways racist caricature was commercialized and normalized in early 20th-century Anglo-American culture. These materials are studied today for their role in spreading and reinforcing hateful stereotypes of African Americans through print and performance.

Verso Message (Transcription):

Dewey, Okla.

Aug 1, 1910

“Dear Sister, I hope you are better than you were and that the hot weather don’t hurt you any. We’re all most roast here it is so hot. Will write soon and could you make me a dress pattern from the old one I sent?

Let me know — Maud.”

Addressed to:

Mrs. Louie Blockford

828 East 3rd St

Carthage, Mo.

Postmark is illegible; date is clearly penned as 1910.

Condition:

Moderate wear with chipped corners, short edge tears, and surface creases. Stamp removed; verso shows postmark traces. Sepia image remains clear with good tonal contrast; handwritten message and address fully legible.