Earlier claims to be the first British PPC publisher  (Click the blue link to return to "earlier claims" page)

Possible  Origins of the  1894 Mount Snowdon/Tuck Myth?

   The idea that Tuck published a PPC of Mount Snowdon in 1894 is very unlikely.

   Tuck in 1894 was used to selling  products by the million. There was a small tourist  industry in Snowdon in 1894 but the weather would limit the season and the tourist numbers to a very low level, far below what Tuck would consider viable for a card.   It is noticeable that Tuck's first picture cards were for London views, where realistically print runs in the hundreds of thousands might  be hoped for, rather than in the hundreds or thousands as here.                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

          The Snowdon Mountain Railway (picture from a 1930's PPC) was not opened until 1896,  which would have further limited tourist numbers. Even in 1896 picture cards of Snowdon were scarce (confined to photographs pasted on to official cards?)

 Given this background of very low  visitor/tourist  numbers, how could this Tuck myth have arisen? An account of early picture cards development by Richard Carline in his excellent book, "Pictures in the Post"  gives a  possible answer. Richard points out that there seems to have been a fashion  in the early 1890s for a souvenir card to commemorate the fact that you had climbed something, anything!. This fashion started out with the Eiffel Tower view cards of 1889. Richard thinks that this 1889 Eiffel Tower card really "kick started" the whole picture card revolution. He points out that the Eiffel Tower card was exhibited by the UK Postal authorities in 1890 and was followed up by a "Top of Eddystone Lighthouse" card in 1891. There certainly was a strong fashionable idea about,  that if you climbed something,  then it should be commemorated by a view card!

   Certainly very crude efforts exist for a Snowdon view card , made by pasting a picture on to an official card. Richard does not claim that these were issued by Tuck. Given that the idea of a "top of anything" card was in the air,  I can only guess that some excitable journalist suggested to Tuck that they might do it for Snowdon?  Tuck could well  have said that they would  consider it, in the sense that they might consider anything at all. Of course Tuck wanted "London view" amount of sales,  not the "Wet April day in Snowdon" level of sales . I think the origin of  this Tuck myth is probably  buried in some long forgotten press article. The trade journals of the time were  desperate for "filler" copy.

   Of course the acid test is to find such a Tuck card, this has not occurred so far and IMO is not likely to occur, given that Tuck was concerned with the possibility of substantial  sales .In a way this reputed Tuck/Snowdon card has become an "abominable snowman" of the PPC world;  talked about but never seen!

 I show below an 1889 Eiffel Tower card (Libonis) that Richard thinks kicked off this picture card craze. (Click on thumbnail picture to enlarge). A  number of other publishers produced these French  "Top of Eiffel Tower"  cards though out the 1890s (N.D, Neurdein  etc). This one was posted from the first "etage"

  Earlier claims to be the first British PPC publisher  (Click the blue link to return to "Earlier claims" page)