
World’s
Most Boring Looking Postcard
By
Carlton Hendricks
...So all fine and dandy…but what does J.S. Blackton have
to do with sports antiques you say…answer…he was a pioneer powerboat racer…
picked up this postcard on eBay
recently…It’s from the 1912 era when postcards were real photographs as opposed to mass produced printed ones…for the most part
I think they are considered more valuable by postcard collectors… They are commonly known by the initialism RPPC for Real Photo Postcard…I’m not a big postcard guy so they have to be something for me to get involved…The man walking is
James Stuart Blackton…He was a pioneer of the film industry…he started Vitagraph Studios in 1897 in
Brooklyn...by 1907 Vitagraph Studios was the biggest name in silent films…Warner Bros. bought Vitagraph Studios in 1925…Blackton also co-founded the first fan magazine “The Motion Picture Story Magazine” in 1911…He is also called the father of American animation as he literally invented it…and on and on James Stuart Blackton was one of the world’s most influential media pioneers that hardly anyone has heard of today...Basically
he was the Steven Spielberg of his time...and more...
So all fine and dandy…but what does J.S. Blackton have to do with sports antiques you say…answer…he was a pioneer powerboat racer…getting into it right as the hydroplane evolved from the dispersion type speedboat….about 1912…Essentially before the hydroplane style boats came on the scene they were plowing thru water not over it…A
common story I've read is the hydroplanes started in Europe then
caught on in the United States…just as motors got powerful enough to create hull
lift…I'm not fully sure of that but I know the Europeans were
certainly racing them early on and it could be true...


Getting
back to our postcard though...let's examine it closer... yes it looks boring...you've got a man walking, wearing
some
odd rain gear get-up...with a funny looking hat...But I like this
card because he was obviously caught off guard...his puckered up
expression looks like he was about to say something...He
practically invented modern media and would never have released a
photo of himself like that...We see society ladies seated wearing
fancy flowered hats ...we see
well dressed kids....Generally it looks like a festive day of fun
and excitement of watching the new phenomena of powerboat
racing...ala 1912...The story of the race posted below provides as
much that this race in St. Augustine Florida for the Southern
Championship had just newly replaced Palm Beach as the opening
race of the powerboat race season...Very
fortunately the
hand scribbled white notation at the bottom is packed with
information...the who, what, where...

The
notation reads, "Com. J.S. Blackton, owner Vita Jr. St
Augustine, FLA"...For the benefit of post baby-boomers, the
com. has nothing to do with .com...It stands for
Commodore...As well as being founding principle of the Vitagraph
motion picture studio, Blackton was the Commodore of the Atlantic Yacht
Club...which was located in South Brooklyn, on Gravesend Bay...( still
active today)...There appears to have been more to the notation underneath...You
can very slightly see what looks like the top of more writing with the same white
marker...likely trimmed away to conform to postcard size. So in
summary we
have the subject's name and city where the photo was taken ...with him referenced as the owner of
"Vita Jr."....What is a Vita Jr. you ask...


The
Vita Jr. was an early....make that one of the earliest...hydroplane
race boats in America...obviously named for the company he founded "Vitagraph"
motion picture company...I was able to find quite a few references
to the Vita Jr, along with the photo above!...From what I gleaned
J. S. Blackton owned it and another boat named
"Vita"...that he and his wife both raced...

Powerboat racing like yachting and polo were
big with the elite…From what I
gather reading newspaper and boating magazines...basically the rich that got into powerboat racing never just had one boat…they would get one and race it…then they or their mechanics would come up with some way to go faster and they’d have a new one
built…Price was typically no object…For example...in that NYT
clipping above...which gives all the background on the Vita Jr....one
part said "The motor equipment alone
cost over $3,000.00"...I looked up the 2022 U.S. dollar equivalent today...A little under
$92,000.00....just for the motor equipment...Then you have the rest of
design and construction cost...
Consider that
the whole world was on a gasoline motor high just coming out of
the horse and buggy era in 1912...Everyone was starting to understand the
possibilities of the gasoline
engine....cars...boats...airplanes...It's
not surprising Blackton was into powerboat racing considering his analytical
abilities he displayed developing cinema...

Looking
for reference to the Vita Jr. in the boating journals and news
clippings gets tedious...lots of dead ends...I really wanted a
photo of it...So what do I find...bingo...not only a photo but the
complete story of the race this postcard photo was taken at....I
had just about given up and blam I found it...not only a photo of
the boat but the end all...a shot of Blackton wearing the same
slicker while driving the boat...Below the story from Motor
Boating Magazine
BELOW,
3 PAGE EXCERPT FROM MAY 1912 MOTOR BOATING MAGAZINE
Containing
full coverage of the
Southern
Championship race the J.S. Blackton postcard photo was
taken at
CLICK
PAGES TO ENLARGE |

MAGAZINE
PAGE 3
CLICK
PAGES TO ENLARGE
|

MAGAZINE
PAGE 4 |

MAGAZINE
COVER |

MAGAZINE
PAGE 5 |
So
how did you know who J.S. Blackton was you might ask....Good
question...About four or five years ago I was poking around
Facebook for antique powerboats....and came across a tether boat
group in which someone posted a photo of a c1912 paperweight that
had a silver plate speedboat figure of the "Baby
Reliance II" speed boat which Blackton owned...I was stopped
in my tracks...I had never seen anything like it...It was engraved
from J.S. Blackton to C.A. Criqui...the boat's engine builder...I
contacted the owner of the paperweight to see if it was
for sale...He said he wasn't ready to sell it....I got to know him and he has become my go-to guy for questions about powerboat
antiques...He lives right near Detroit...the heart of powerboating
history...About once a year I send him a box of See's Candy peanut
brittle to remind him I'm interested if he ever sells it... 
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