This postcard is a sad memorial to several young women.
Tillie (“Tilda”) Myren resided in Mound City, a very small town (and county seat) in Campbell County of north-central South Dakota.
The settlement was named for the evidence of ancient “Mound Culture” indigenous people in the area.
In 2020, the town had 69 residents.
https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mound_City,_South_Dakota
There were eight daughters in the Myren family of South Dakota – we met Bertha and Clara Myren in earlier postcard stories:
“Get a Horse and Come Horseback” (Eureka, South Dakota in 1910)
The Myren girls were the children of Tollev Knute Myren (1866-1944) and Guri Pedersdatter Myren (1862-1925).
(Sadly, two of the girls, twins Christina and Marie, died in infancy.
In July of 1909, Tillie received a birthday postcard from Rose.
The postcard was mailed from Chicago.
Rose identifies herself as a friend of Bertha, but there are no clues as to how the friends were connected across more than 780 miles.
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The face of the postcard is a colorful drawing of a long-stemmed red rose extended through a horseshoe.
Superimposed on the blossom, in large letters, is the word, “Congratulations”
The deeply embossed drawing (see the reverse) was “Printed in Germany”.
I could not distinguish a publisher’s mark.
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On the reverse of the postcard, Rosie inscribed only, “Congratulations from your sister Bertha’s pal”.
From the earlier postcard story, we know that Tillie’s sister (and Rose’s pal), Bertha, died in Mound City during 1916.
Bertha was only 24 years old when she died.
In researching Tillie, I learned shat she died in 1913, at the age of 20.
https://www.familysearch.org/en/tree/person/details/LBXX-Y9G
Furthermore, of the eight Myren girls, only three reached mature years:
Alma (1890-1977)
Clara (1899-1979)
Ida (1901-1977)
The two boys, born last, were Krohn (1902-1990) and Palmer (1906-1983).
Tilda and Bertha (and the other unmarried sisters) are buried with individual stone tablets in the Norway Lutheran Church Cemetery in Mound City.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/103772793/tilda-myren
