The Misses De Puy lived in Jenkintown, a prosperous borough in Montgomery County of southeast Pennsylvania.
The first European immigrants settled in this area about 1697.
By 1900, the community of 2000 persons was already becoming a center of trade in the region north of Philadelphia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenkintown,_Pennsylvania
In the Research Note (below), we learn that “The Misses De Puy” were three sisters: (Frances Marguerite (1888-1976), Clara (1889 -1964), and Bertha Webb (1890-1976).
Cousin Bella uses the French form, “De Puy”, although the girls and their parents used “Depuy”.
In October of 1903, the sisters received a postcard from their cousin, Isabella Foster.
The postcard was mailed from Tarrytown, a village now within the town of Greenburgh in Westchester County of southeast New York.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarrytown,_New_York
This area on the east back of the Hudson River, about 25 miles north of Manhattan, was made famous by resident author Washington Irving who set his “Knickerbocker Tales” among the early Dutch communities here.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Irving
(Part of historic Tarrytown is now the community of “Sleepy Hollow”.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleepy_Hollow,_New_York
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The face of the postcard shows a photograph of “Miss Mason’s School for Girls” which occupied “The Tower” in Tarrytown.
This vine-encrusted, Neo-Gothic structure was commissioned in the 1850’s as a country house for merchant, John J. Herrick.
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/339844
The architect, Alexander Jackson Davis, had completed other palatial country homes in the Hudson Valley.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Jackson_Davis
Unfortunately, the Herrick family, like other successive owners, did not long enjoy the hilltop mansion.
In 1895, “The Castle” came into the possession of Cassity Eliza Mason who turned it into “Miss Mason’s Finishing School for Girls”.
The forbidding exterior gave rise to numerous local legends and folk tales of ghosts, secret rooms, hidden corridors, and mysterious sounds of chains, crashes, and groaning.
Unfortunately, Miss Mason’s school closed in the 1930’s, and the structure was razed in 1944.
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Because the postcard has an “undivided back”, Cousin Bella wrote a brief message on the margin of the face.
Bella begins by asking, “How do you all do?”
She adds, “Greetings to each of you”.
Although her full name of Isabella Foster is written on the reverse, “Cousin Bella” uses the informal identification on the face.
Someone in the De Puy household preserved the postcard as it has survived in decent condition.
One hopes that the De Puy sisters exchanged many more postcard with their cousin.
RESEARCH NOTE
The three Depuy sisters were the only children of Henry Eugene (Harry) Depuy (1856-1920) and Frances Sheldon (Fanny) Noble (1859-1924).
Fanny was born in Connecticut, but married Harry in Jenkintown in 1885.
The middle sister, Clara, never married -and appears to have lived in the family home in Jenkintown throughout her life.
Clara twice received a Passport, so she may have traveled.
The photograph was uploaded to Clara’s Memorial Site (below)
In 1913, the eldest sister, Frances, was married to Herbert Aubrey Smith (1884-1958) in Jenkintown.
Trances and Herbert had one son, Henry Depuy Smith (1914-1973).
The youngest daughter, Bertha, was married to Robert William Davis, Jr. (1883-1957) in Jenkintown in April of 1911.
This is a photograph uploaded to Bertha’s Memorial Site (below):
Bertha and Robert had two daughters and one son. All the Depuy families lived in and around Montgomery County for many years, although Bertha and her family moved to Harford County, Maryland around 1930.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/82539346/frances-marguerite-smith
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/195423255/clara-depuy
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/233906380/bertha-davis
