The Sacrament of the Last Supper

Postcard US-3957031 to China shows a painting The Sacrament of the Last Supper by Salvador Dalí. Completed in 1955 after nine months of work, it remains one of his most popular compositions. Since its arrival at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. in 1955, it replaced Renoir's A Girl with a Watering Can as the most popular piece in the museum.

Marilyn Monroe

Postcard US-1852497 to Ukraine shows a 1955 movie scene with actress Marilyn Monroe appearing in the Seven Year Itch where her dress blows up from the subway grate. It becomes one of the most famous Marilyn Monroe scenes of all time. The subway grate is marked at East 52nd Street and Lexington Ave in New York City.

Fifty three years ago on Saturday May 19, 1962, Marilyn Monroe sung "Happy Birthday, Mr. President" for President John F. Kennedy at a celebration of his forty-fifth birthday, ten days before his actual date on Tuesday May 29, 1962.

Less than three months later, Monroe was found dead at her home at 12305 Fifth Helena Drive in Brentwood, Los Angeles, California on August 5, 1962. She was 36 years old.

Last Night for Riviera Las Vegas

Postcard US-2520811 to Germany shows the Riviera Las Vegas, which is scheduled to close permanently tomorrow at noon on May 4, 2015. It just celebrated its 60th anniversary in operation on April 20, 2015. The 2,000-room hotel opened on April 20, 1955 as the first high-rise on the Las Vegas Strip. It was home to many legendary singers and performers such as Liberace, Frank Sinatra, Bob Hope, Elvis, Wayne Newton and Dolly Parton.

The landmark casino and hotel was purchased by the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority for about $190 million. The hotel will be imploded to make room for convention center expansion.

Santa in an Airship High Over the Panama Canal

A wrong number listed on a Colorado Springs newspaper advertisement by Sears started NORAD's Santa Tracking program in 1955. Google also started to track Santa's movement in 2004 as a Google Maps service. However, the radar tracking may reveal Santa is not on a sleigh after all, as the vintage postcard US-3141511 from Virginia shows that Santa Claus on an airship overlooks the opening of the Panama Canal in 1914.

Berkeley Pit Panorama

Postcard US-2967625 to the Netherlands was a vintage card showing a panorama of the Berkeley Pit, an open pit copper mine in Butte, Montana. Ektachromes by Clifford B. Ellis.

The mine, once the largest truck-operated open pit copper mine in the United States, was opened in 1955 and operated by Anaconda Copper. The Atlantic Richfield Company (ARCO) bought the mine in 1977, and it was closed in 1982. Approximately 320 million tons of ore and over 700 million tons of waste rock were mined from the Butte Hill.

Measured one mile long (1.6 km) by half a mile (0,8 km) wide with an approximate depth of 1,780 feet (540 m), the pit began to collect groundwater from the surrounding aquifers once it was closed as the water pumps in the nearby shaft were turned off. Pyrite and sulfide minerals in the ore and wall rocks met dissolved oxygen in the water, releasing heavy metals and chemicals including copper, arsenic, cadmium, zinc, and sulfuric acid. According to PitWatch, with the bottom elevation at 4,263 feet above the sea level and the water level at 5,318.49 feet above sea level as of July 30, 2014, the pit had filled a depth of 1,055 feet (321.6 m) with water that was highly acidic (2.5 pH level) since 1982. Current projections estimate that the Critical Level at 5,410 feet above the sea level, which is close to the natural water table, will be reached around 2023 when the pit water may reverse flow back into groundwater, polluting Silver Bow Creek and rivers downstream.

The Berkeley Pit has since become one of the largest Superfund sites. Clean up plans have been in place since the 1990s.

Memories

Postcard BY-1337780 from Belarus features an oil painting on canvas made with a palette knife by artist Leonid Afremov, born in the city of Vitebsk, Belarus in 1955. Leonid Afremov graduated from the famous Vitebsk Art School in 1978. The school was founded by Marc Chagall (July 6, 1887 – March 28, 1985), a Belarussian-Russian-French artist, in 1921. Leonid Afremov moved to Israel in 1990, and became known as a Israeli modern painter of landscapes, cityscapes and figures. "The scorching southern sun filled with colors and brightness made Leonid's paintings positive and joyous."

Rainbow Fleet at Nantucket, MA

Postcard US-2293205 to California features a 1955 poster showing the Rainbow Sailboat Fleet at Nantucket, Massachusetts. The Nantucket Yacht Club chose Beetle Cats, 12.25 ft or 3.76 m catboats first built in 1920 in New Bedford, Massachusetts by members of the Beetle family,  for its fleet with the sails in different colors in 1925.

The Nantucket Yacht Club and the Great Harbor Yacht Club are hosting its 20th annual Nantucket Race Week to promote affordable access to sailing and water sports to the public starts on Saturday August 9, 2014, with the Rainbow Fleet Parade scheduled at 9:30 am on August 17, 2014.

The postcard was purchased from LanternPress's store at Zazzle.

Happy 58th Birthday: Disneyland!

The Art of Disney: Imagination Stamped Postal Cards

Disneyland at Anaheim, California first opened on July 17, 1955.  it was built on a 160-acre orange orchard costing $17 million. The original park included Main Street, Adventureland, Frontierland, Fantasyland, and Tomorrowland. Over the years, more attractions have been added. Now it grows into two parks: Disneyland Park and Disney California Adventure Park. The newest attraction was the Cars Land opened last year with a massive mountain range in the Disney California Adventure Park, inspired by the 2006 Disney-Pixar film "Cars". The admission to Disneyland in 1955 was US$ 1.00. A 1-day one park ticket in 2013 is US$ 92.00.

The postcard US-2032235, sent to Poland and featuring Mickey Mouse as Steamboat Willie, was from "the Art of Disney: Imagination Stamped Postal Cards" with 27-cent pre-printed stamps. Those stamps are identical to the 42 stamps issued by the U.S. Postal Service at Disneyland Resort, in Anaheim, California, on August 7, 2008.

Never Be Fearful About What You Are Doing When It Is Right

Rosa Parks Bus at Henry Ford Museum

Fifty nine years ago on May 17, 1954, United States Supreme Court declared state laws establishing separate public schools for black and white students unconstitutional in the landmark case Brown v. Board of Education. That ruling signified a turning point and was a major victory for the civil rights movement.

When I was searching for a postcard for an 8th grade teacher in Taiwan to show her students, I found one marking another historical event in the same era. On December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Rosa Parks, on her bus trip home after work, refused to obey bus driver's order to yield her seat to a white passenger. Her act of defiance and the Montgomery Bus Boycott became important symbols of the modern civil rights movement. It resulted in another Supreme Court decision on November 13, 1956 to upheld a district court's ruling to desegregate the buses. The card shows the restored Rosa Parks bus currently on exhibit in Henry Ford Museum.

With a USPS stamp issued on February 4, 2013 to commemorate Rosa Parks' 100th birthday, I hope the card can convey an important message to the students. “You must never be fearful about what you are doing when it is right.” said Rosa Parks.