Mrs. E. C. Warner lived in Minneapolis, the thriving city of mills and food processing plants on the Mississippi River in southeast Minnesota.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minneapolis
The home of Mrs. Warner at 4754 Fremont Avenue South is a beautiful 3-story structure with an attached sun room or conservatory.
The house was constructed in 1907 and is a short distance from Lake Harriett.
https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/4754-Fremont-Ave-S-Minneapolis-MN-55419/1836733_zpid
In March of 1922, Mrs. Warner received a postcard from Bertie B.
The postcard was mailed from Jacksonville, now a center of commerce and banking and the most populous city in Florida.
The first European settlement in this area along the St. Johns River was made by the French in 1564, but the continental wars led to successive occupation by the Spanish and the British.
Once the site of vast plantations for the cultivation of sugar cane, fruit, and indigo -along with the harvesting of lumber.
In the Gilded Age of the late 19th century, Jacksonville became a winter resort for the rich and famous who traveled to the city by steamboat and railroads.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacksonville,_Florida
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The face of the postcard displays a rural road passing under a spreading live oak tree – the tree is draped in moss.
A printed title identifies the tree as the “Royal Arch Oak”, a famous tree that is featured on numerous postcards – seen below in a photograph from the Library of Congress.
https://www.loc.gov/item/2016799198
Beneath the scene is a whimsical verse describing how Mother Nature directs fairies to cover the live oak tree with a “silvery canopy” of moss.
The rhyming lines terms the mossy canopy as a “gift to the earth-folk”.
While the image of moss-draped trees is common to the mystique of the “Old South”, anyone who has passed under these canopies or has had occasion to be brushed by dangling moss may dispute the idea of a “gift”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_moss
The author of the verse is identified as Ada Marshall.
The postcard was copyrighted and published by F. C. Pfeiffer of Daytona, Florida.
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On the reverse, Bertie begins the message without a salutation – “wonderful weather, wish you were here”.
Yesterday’s activity included a drive to the beach, and today featured a game of bridge.
We next learn that Jessica is “having a fine time”.
It seems that Mrs. Warner has been ill, as Bertie closes with, “Hope you have recovered”.
The message was sent with “Love.”
One hopes that Bertie and Jessica continued to enjoy their winter vacation, that Mrs. Warner was fully restored to health, and that the friends maintained their postcard correspondence for many years.
