I have discovered there were three series:
1. The Laura H Davey paintings. These are distinctive and interesting, as they are four colour halftone prints, printed in Australia. Produced about 1906, these would be amongst the earliest colour halftones made in Australia. But they have both the W.T. Pater and the Osboldstone logos on the back, so we don't know which of these was the printer.
2. What I have called Pater's Tasmanian Series. These have the caption on a black background on the front of the card. Back of card is green, with WTP logo. This series is notable for the spelling errors in the captions; 'Goot. House' for 'Govt. House' for example .
3. Identical to Pater's Tasmanian Series, but the back is without the WTP logo.
I Think the third series was made by the German printer for sale in Europe only. I have only seen two examples, but both have been from Holland. Below is the front and back of one of these. The front shows the mis-spelling of 'Bower' as 'Bomer'. The back was printed with an advertisement for H.P. v. Widjland, for his 'rijwielhandel', which is Dutch for 'bicycle shop'. I suppose he bought a batch of cards from the printer, who printed his advertisement on the back by letterpress. With the absence of the WTP logo, it is clear that these were not meant for Pater in Melbourne, but used in Europe.
Any more example of this series without the WTP logo would be appreciated.
If you would like to see more of the W.T. Pater cards, I put them on my website at http://www.beecheyspostcardhistory.org.au
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- 2092B.jpg (104.79 KiB) Viewed 938 times