This website was originally created by the Hamilton Region Branch
of the ACO in 2003 with the assistance of a grant from the Ontario
Trillium Foundation. The idea for this website was generated
through preliminary discussions between Ken Elder and Ann Gillespie
in 2001. Ken and I had been acquainted since the 1970s
when I studied and worked in Ottawa. Ken has been an avid collector
of postcards since the 1970s and as a conservation architect,
also possesses a keen interest in historic buildings and engineering
works (see Background on Ken Elder below).
He maintains a special interest in Hamilton, where he grew up,
and his collection now includes over 1500 postcards of the Hamilton
area. The majority of these postcards date from the first half
of this century and depict images relating to the former City
of Hamilton. Ken approached me with the idea of creating a websitefor
his Hamilton collection, primarily with a view to making these
images available for research purposes. As an Executive member
of the Hamilton Region Branch of the ACO, I approached my colleagues
with the idea of undertaking such a project as a joint venture.
The status of our Branch as a not-for-profit organization would
enable us to seek public funding for the project. Our goal from
the beginning was to create a website with detailed information
about the subject matter of the postcards that would be useful
to amateur and professional researchers as well as to provide
useful and accurate information about the postcards, from a collector’s
standpoint, based on Ken Elder’s
deltiological expertise. We also wanted to make it equally accessible
to the casual visitor. In this way, it was hoped that the website
would appeal to the broadest possible spectrum of visitors.
The
website was officially launched in September 2003 with a complementary
exhibition of enlarged postcard images in the Community Gallery
of the Art Gallery of Hamilton. By early 2004, approximately 1000
images had been entered into the database. Data entry was completed
by Ann Gillespie with substantial input from Ken Elder. In February
2004 the website was transferred to the hosting company, Total
Environment by web designer Karen Nagy, who designed and maintains
our shared Architecture
Hamilton site. Ann Gillespie
assumed responsibility for website maintenance and updates. Further
expansion of the database was put on hold pending the redesign
of the website to improve its visual appearance, navigation
structure and search capabilities.
Moving Forward in 2005
New Database and Web Server At the end of January
2005 we moved from a Microsoft Windows Server / Microsoft SQL Server
environment to one based on Linux,
the Apache
Web Server, and a
PostgreSQL database. Without
this change, it would not have been possible for Total
Environment
to continue to host the website and offer us a reduced rate on
our hosting package.
The Branch is indebted to Stewart Patch for his donation of time
and expertise to the conversion of the
Search page from an ASP to a PHP page, thereby enabling the
database to run on an Apache
Web Server.
Reconstruction of the Website
The next major challenge was the complete redesign and reconstruction of the
website, undertaken by Ann Gillespie and
Stewart Patch, based on a proposal submitted to and accepted by the Hamilton
Region Branch in August 2005. The goal was to enhance both the look and functionality
of the website, while retaining a key feature of the design of the original
website - the Canadian View postcard back which provided the source of inspiration
for the design of the original Home and sub-pages and the renewed website.
With this goal accomplished, Branch efforts will be directed towards seeking
new sources of funding to continue with the addition of postcards to the
database.
This attractive Art Nouveau
style Canadian View postcard back provided
the inspiration for the graphic component of both the original
and new Home page. The new version of the Home
page preserves the the original proportions of
the postcard back and graphic, which serves as a framework
for the body content.
The green, King Edward
VII stamp, issued July 1st, 1903, was was by far the most
common stamp seen on Canadian postcards during the Golden
Age of the picture postcard and appears on many of the postally-used
cards in Ken Elder’s
collection.
Principal Contributors
Ken Elder, deltiologist, Ottawa (2003 - 2005) Ann Gillespie, Gillespie-Kramer
Heritage Consulting,
Dundas (2003 - 2004: project co-ordination, database entry,
website maintenance: 2005: redesign and reconstruction of the
website, in collaboration with Stewart Patch, Patchwork
Quilt Systems) Chris Vogel, Vigraph Computer
Services, Dundas
(2003 website design) Jon Kay, Toronto (subcontracted by Vigraph to
construct the database) Karen Nagy (2004 transfer of website to new
hosting company: Total Environment) Stewart Patch, Patchwork Quilt Systems (reconfiguration
of database to run on Total Environment’s Linux servers, January
2005; upgrade of the search page to select multiple subjects beginning with different
letters and allow browsing of the entire database; uploading renewed
site to remote server)
Background
on Ken Elder Ken Elder worked for over thirty
years as a conservation architect for the federal government
in Ottawa, most recently as Supervising Conservation Architect
in the Heritage Conservation Program of Public Works and
Government Services Canada. Since retiring in 2002, he
has continued to work for this department on a part-time
base. A native of Hamilton, Ontario, and a long-time deltiologist,
Ken’s hobby has focused since 1970 on the collection
and study of historic postcards published in and to some
extent beyond North America. To date his collection exceeds
25,000 postcards. In the early 1980’s, Ken undertook
with Ron McGuire (then Head of Research, National Postal
Museum) to catalogue all historic postcard images of Ottawa.
When the project was terminated in 1985, roughly 3,500
postcard images had been catalogued. In recent years, Ken
had a selection of the Ottawa postcards entered into an
in-house database for use by historians and consultants
preparing reports for Parks Canada and the Heritage Conservation
Program.
The banner
image is taken from a circa 1930 postcard view of Battlefield
House and the Stoney Creek monument from the Vintage
Postcards of Hamilton website. Try searching
the database for other postcard views with more information.
For most accurate Search Results, select parks
and gardens from the SUBJECT MENU and type Stoney
Creek into the KEYWORD field.
