Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Sometimes even I am amazed at the unexpected things that turn up in this tiny apartment. The other day I came across this which I had purchased early in my photo collecting career and tucked away. While I do remember the purchase, on eBay, it was like it was new.

It is a photo postcard and it is printed upside down on the postcard paper – and sloppily as you can see, overexposed and with a messy bottom edge. Still, what a wonderfully whack-a-doodle card this is! Clearly an interesting and homemade (and somewhat terrifying) take on the Little Red Riding Hood story – the “wolf” a bit cat-like (which might explain how it even ended up in my hands) but that axeman more than scary enough to keep any wolf in line. Little Red Riding Hood pales somewhat in comparison to her angelic cohorts who seem to be additions to the story. Grandma does not seem to make the scene at all. By necessity, their story seems to take place on the barren prairie rather than the forest. Still, one assumes a good time was had by all and that it was one heck of a show.

Oddly, the writing on the back of the postcard makes no reference to the image. A neat script on the back says, I suppose you are farming now. I hope you were not sick long. Mrs. Walsh. It is addressed to Max McCandless, St. John, Kansas. It is not stamped and therefore there is no postmark date.

The Little Red Riding Hood story has always interested me. I loved the outfit – the red riding hood I suppose. I grew up on a sanitized version of the story where the woodsman just saved Little Red from the wolf – it was a while before I encountered the original where she has to be cut out of the wolf’s tummy. Ick. I always felt badly for that wolf whose sweet tooth for picnic baskets, little girls and grandmas got him in a whole lot of trouble.