We have a shelf of books published years ago by Time/Life. They cover just about every weird and strange thing under the sun – from vanished civilizations to famous hoaxes and deceptions to unusual talents. This evening, I was paging through one called Vanishings and ran across a rather interesting story about a postcard that took seven years to arrive at its destination. We’ve done several stories about lost items that return to their owners in mysterious ways. This story seems to fall in that same odd area.
On September 22, 1918, a man named George Kemp mailed off a postcard to his young nephew, Donald Templeton, who lived in Buffalo, New York. At the time, Kemp was in the trenches in France and WWI was in its last seven weeks.
Kemp was killed in the final weeks of the war and the postcard to his nephew never reached the boy. Finally, 63 years after the postcard was sent, on July 6, 1981, it reached the Buffalo address. Kemp’s relatives had moved away years before, but the current residents traced Donald Templeton to his home in Florida and forwarded the postcard. By then, Templeton was 72 years old.
What’s genuinely curious about this is that the postcard was covered with numerous postmarks. The first was a stamp by a military censor in Frances, postmarked in 1918, the same year it was sent. The second stamp was in 1927, the last in 1981, shortly before it was finally delivered to Templeton’s former address in Buffalo. . The first and the last stamps are usual. But no one can explain what happened to the letter in 1927. The postcard disappeared once, resurfaced nine years later – long enough to get a stamp – and then vanished again for more than half a century.
Whip so often articulates what I am thinking in just the perfect fashion. So I will say : Ditto. 🙂
I’ve read several “lost letter” stories over the years, and they always leave me teary-eyed. The most heartbreaking ones are the cases where a girlfriend/widow of a dead soldier receives a lost letter or postcard (or even a bundle of them, in one instance that I heard about) discovered in a post office some sixty years later. That must be indescribably bittersweet, to glimpse the distant past freshly through the window of time when the letter was written by a young, idealistic soldier just hoping for the war to end, yearning to return home and marry the sweetheart they left behind. I can’t even imagine what that must be like, aside from the moving reunion scene in Forever Young, but it has to absolutely rock your world.
nicely said, Whip!!
what a strange story! I’d be curious to hear about these kinds of odd things happening with emails. thanks for sharing it.
So far, we haven’t heard any similar stories with emails. But now that you’ve brought it up, we probably will!
Am entertaining out-of-town family from GA, here for a week, but will give this my attention a bit later. Very compelling number frequencies and circumstances. I love these kinds of numerical synchronicities and puzzles and will eagerly tackle it ASAP.
You know that big warehouse scene at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark? It was in a box in there…. in the military’s “censored” store room.
Very curious story!
Right! I remember that scene. Hmm. Imagine what other goodies might be found in there.
old accquantice was walking down a gravel road,, that lead to an small airport in northern Caly,,, he looked down on the ground and so an old dirty,, (blank,, not sure) post card,, of a guy throwing fishing line (surf pole) in the SF bay,, down next to the south pier of the golden gate bridge,, he looked at the shoes and said “I recognized them” the pants and said “I recognized them”,,, it was his Pop,,, an old merchant marine… His Dad spent a lot of time on the water,, they had lived about 4 doors down from an uncle of mine,, so when brother came west,,, Sal the old accquaintance had “the house and the funds” party!!!! one house to the east was the Devil’s salesman one more to the east was the brother’s wife to B… wish I’d never heard of that avenue……
Whoot – this sounds like a synchro!
yeahs well like I said wish I’d never hear of the street where they lived,, the guys got the post in a frame,, heard the story spring “01” question though what’s the e-quacke comment from 9/14/09 what would you call that.. I’d call a little green man mind goof…… or maybe just??????
Nice of the person to track down the addressee.
Something that weird, I think I’d feel obligated to track down the addressee.
I know we often moan about the post/mail in the UK but ….
Amazing how these sort of things happen.
And amazing that someone, somewhere, heard about it and wrote it up in a book.
lost in the shadows! what a nifty [that’s a “real” word, isn’t it?] story -and check out the numbers on that – all 3 separate years [1918, 1927 and 1981] add up to 19 = 10 = 1 and the two months given both add up to 4 [9/22 and 7/6 = 13 = 4] – and those two total dates [9/22/1918 and 7/6/1981] both = 5 – the first year [1918] and the last year [1981] have the last two digits reversed [18/81] – well, enough of my playing – i know our numbers lady will be by soon and give us the real lowdown on all this – cj, where are you??? 😉
I hadn’t even looked at the numbers! We need mathaddict to interpret.