1948 Daniel Boone Festival Souvenir Postcard Set
by Charles Reed Mitchell and Michael C. Mills
A set of postcards with scenes from the first Daniel Boone Festival of 1948 was published to be sold as souvenirs of the festival and promotion for the second festival, scheduled October 21 and 22, 1949.
The publication was announced in an article entitled "Plans Being Made For Daniel Boone Festival" in the April 8, 1949 issue of the Barbourville Mountain Advocate:
"To advertise this festival, the committee has secured a series of twelve picture postcards, and these are now on sale. Genuine photographs, they are very attractive, and you may purchase one or the entire series of twelve cards. The price is 5c for a single card, six cards for 25c or 12 for 50c. They are now on sale at Knox County Supply Co. store, Engle's Studio and The Advocate Office. They are excellent pictures and can be used in writing messages to friends and relatives or sent as gifts to advertise the Festival."
Most of the postcards are identified by a credit on the back as having been shot by Louisville Courier-Journal photographers. Phil Fox told a reporter from the Knox Historical Museum that the whole set was based on Courier- Journal photographs. Phil and his daughter Pauline Fox gave the museum a number of the original postcards, along with several photos of the 1948 festival.
The museum has located eleven of the original twelve postcards. The Daniel Boone Festival Committee collection at the museum preserved several other photographs made by visiting Courier-Journal photographers during that first festival, in addition to the postcard set. All of the postcards have the words, "Daniel Boone Festival / Barbourville, Ky." written in white ink on the front photograph side.
Four of the postcards were reproduced from the excellent feature article published in the Courier-Journal Magazine shortly after the festival. The museum staff's best guess as to the identities of the missing three cards is that they probably appeared in the article as an "archery and blow-gun exhibition," Union College students in pioneer costume resting in front of the college library, and the "veterans' village at Union College," all three of which the museum has as photographs, but not as original cards with the white ink caption on the front.
This page may be the first publication of the postcards (although incomplete) as a set since they were issued in 1949.
If anyone can help us locate the other card, all of which will have the festival name and the town written in white ink on the face of the photos, please contact Michael C. Mills or the staff of the Knox Historical Museum.
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