The card shows a banana plant in close view: broad leaves, a cluster of green-yellow fruit, and a large purple bud hanging at the right. The caption calls it a banana tree, though the plant is a giant herb. Each fruiting stalk dies after harvest and new shoots rise from the root, so a mature plant reads more as a thicket than a tree. In Florida, banana plants were mostly dooryard curiosities; frost kept commercial plantings to the warmest parts of the state.
Postcard Details
Message · English, in pen
Feb 24, 1958 St. Augustine, Fla.
Dearest Mother and Folks,
Have just moved up to Park 5 mi.
South of St. Augustine. It is a
very old city + I want to look it
over. Yesterday went to see some
old plantation + sugar mill ruins,
burned in Seminole War of 1835. It
was a very interesting time. More
about that later. Saw bananas
growing in Cuba + looks like
picture on this card. They
grow upside down. That big
purple thing is the blossom. Didn't
see any ripe ones tho. Each
stalk bears one bloom + fruit +
then is cut down + grows up
new each year - is more bush than tree.
PostmarkedSAINT AUGUSTINE, FL, February 24, 1958, 18:00
Linen-textured stock with visible crosshatch weave; no white border. Scan is rotated 90 degrees, so the printed caption runs vertically along the right edge; the publisher imprint runs vertically along the divider and the series number and name vertically at the left edge.
Postmark: SAINT AUGUSTINE FLA FEB 24 6 PM 1958. Divided-back linen Curteich "C.T. Art-Colortone" card mailed 1958; light edge wear, slight corner bumping.
Cite this card
Banana tree showing bud and fruit, Florida, 1958, postcard, c. 1958. PostalPast Collection. https://postalpast.com/postcard/banana-tree-showing-bud-and-fruit-florida-1958. Accessed November 2, 2026.
