Master John Schuler was a boy growing up in Orefield, PA.
Orefield is a small, unincorporated community that was named for iron deposits that were once mined nearby.
A branch of the Ironton Rail Line once served this part of the Lehigh Valley in east-central Pennsylvania.
Orefield is now the home to a large turkey processing industry and is the source for the turkey that is “pardoned” by the US President each November.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orefield,_Pennsylvania
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Sometime around 1909, John received a beautiful hand-colored postcard that shows a tree-shaded, unpaved lane beside the Delaware River.
In the distance, one sees the “Delaware Water Gap”, the natural wonder created by the waters of the river carving a passage through a ridge of the Appalachian Mountains.
The Delaware Water Gap occurs near the juncture of the States of New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey – the Delaware River forming a boundary between northeast Pennsylvania and southeast New York, and between the entire western border of New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delaware_Water_Gap
The postcard illustration is titled, “Driveway Delaware Water Gap”.
(In several vintage postcards, I have seen a similar archaic usage of “driveway” to indicate a lane or rustic roadway.)
On the reverse, we see that the lovely picture is an inducement to save information about insurance policies from the Prudential Insurance Company of America.
https://www.ncpers.org/prudential-insurance
This is not the only example of scenic Prudential advertisements that we have seen – some time ago we discussed a wonderful view of Lake George that also promoted Prudential products.
Although these postcards did not provide a space for a written message -which would make the postcards much more useful to customers – Prudential seems to assume that the postcards would be collected or shared in ways that would keep their name and products in front of viewers.
A faint pencil inscription on the reverse indicates that the postcard was given to John by “Bertha Schuler”.
I assume that Bertha is a sister or other relative.
John Schuler did preserve the postcard throughout his life.
GENEALOGICAL NOTE
In 1896, John H. Schuler was born in Lehigh County, PA.
He was the son of Albert J. D. Shuler (1864-1943) and Sarah Jane Snyder (1868-1955).
John had seven brothers and three sisters.
One of his sisters was Bertha (“Bertie”) L. Schuler (1896-1950).
It is not clear if John and Bertha were twins -John’s birth date is identified only by the year.
John lived in his parent’s home in Lehigh County through the 1910 US Census.
There is no record of a marriage.
John is listed as a resident of Allentown, PA and as a surviving brother, in the obituary of Bertha in 1950 – but I could not find a death record for him.
Sister Bertha lived in Lehigh County throughout her life.
In February of 1913, Bertha married Joel Daniel Brown in Bethlehem, PA
Bertha and Joel had two sons, both of whom lived to the last years of the 20th century.
Bertha died in 1950 at age 54.
