Greetings from Jamestown, N.Y., Egyptian novelty, 1917

About this postcard

A novelty greeting pairs a tree-lined river view with an Egyptian vignette of pyramids, palm trees, camels, mud huts, and a domed building. The verse asks who would want to visit Egypt, with its pyramids and sand, when such scenery is easily reached in one's own native land. The greeting names Jamestown, New York, a city in Chautauqua County in western New York State, on the Chadakoin River at the outlet of Chautauqua Lake. The card belongs to the early 20th-century taste for comic composite souvenirs, which set a local view beside an exotic or humorous scene and made a joke of the contrast.