• Digitization

    Your Digital Postcard from Panama

    November 24, 2025 /
    Black and white photograph of a 1930s style car with C.Z. Mail written on the side.

    Arrived last Sunday after having a delightful trip. It is more beautiful here than anything I have ever dreamed of.

    – Postcard from H.H.W. to Miss Veronica Herz, 1907, Empire, Canal Zone

    Bucyrus steam shovel 112 digging beside small houses and buildings and filling dump cars.
    Postcard of a Steam Shovel in Operation on the Canal. Mailed from Empire, Canal Zone, December 4, 1907. II.2017.36.105.347. Brad Wilde Postcard Collection. The handwritten caption reads: Arrived last Sunday after having a delightful trip. It is more beautiful here than anything I have ever dreamed of. Address Empire, Canal Zone H.H.W.

    We are proud to be the home of the Brad Wilde Postcard Collection which holds over 15,000 digital and 5,000 physical postcards depicting life and work in Panama, the Canal Zone, and at the Panama Canal.1

    Over 6,200 are now available online and more are going up every day!

    Having a collection of this size is a tremendous opportunity to explore the environment and the people who lived and worked at the Canal. It includes both publisher and real photo postcards as well as mailed and unmailed. Real photo postcards are especially valuable because they are unique images taken by individual people.

    Postcards are amazing resources. They illustrate the changes in a location over the decades and can provide personal tidbits of life at the time if they were used.

    If you look closely in the early photograph you can see that the palm trees are so new that they are still surrounded by protective wire cages. II.2021.36.105.5797 and II.2021.36.105.2492. Brad Wilde Postcard Collection. Click this link to view a larger version of the early photograph, https://ufdc.ufl.edu/aa00116743/00001.
    Postcards of the Rear View of the Tivoli Hotel. Note the addition of the 3-story wing in 1911. These details can help us date photographs and images on unused postcards that do not have a cancellation stamp. II.2021.36.105.5427 and II.2021.36.105.5423. Brad Wilde Postcard Collection.
    Postcard of 1911 Carnival with a group of children wearing hats that read “Compaña Infantile Bomberos,” March 22, 1911. II.2021.36.105.904. Brad Wilde Postcard Collection. The note on the back reads: “Dear Mother – Everett and I were out rowing all day yesterday and my face looks like a boiled lobster. Frank.”
    Postcard of Balboa School, Balboa, c. 1925. II.2021.36.105.3236. Brad Wilde Postcard Collection. The note on the back reads: “Dear Amy. The picture on the other side is the knowledge factory where Edith got her early training. Rush also gained a little information here. This school is going full blast now.”
    The back of a postcard with a handwritten note.

    This postcard, mailed from Ancon to a family member in New York in 1913 includes another humorous slice of life.

    It reads: “Dear Catherine – Here I am in Panama & this is the hottest place on Earth. Wish you could see these palms, coconuts, banana trees & so on – Enjoyed your letter, will write soon. Sincerely, Uncle Henry.”

    Left: Back of Postcard: View of Ancon Hospital Grounds, Panama. II.2021.36.105.3904. Brad Wilde Postcard Collection.

    Black and white photograph of the front of a wooden and plaster three story building.

    When we were selecting postcards for this post, we of course found the perfect one for the October post Panama’s Past in Print (and now online!) about newspapers and the Star & Herald in Panama.

    Left: Postcard. Star & Herald Building where the paper was first published in 1849 – Panama. II.2021.36.105.346. Brad Wilde Postcard Collection.

    And this one of a Navy plane at Coco Solo that would have been great for the Digital Intel post.

    Right: Coco Solo Navy Airplane. Brad Wilde Postcard Collection.

    A black and white photograph of a group of people standing around a Navy airplane. The tail of the plane as the words Coco Solo painted on it.

    We also found a postcard touting the benefits of the asbestos shingles installed on “the first permanent building erected by the U.S. Canal Commission in Panama.” Postcard: Caretaker’s Residence Brazos Brook Reservoir. II.2021.36.105.141. Brad Wilde Postcard Collection. Click on the images to enlarge.

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    II.2021.36.105.141-Back

    There were two postcards with identical images but different captions. One is, “Americans Bathing in the Panama Canal Locks at Gatun Sept. 1st, day after Water was Admitted to Locks.” The other is, “Aquatic Sports at Miraflores Locks.”

    Can any of you Canal experts look at the image and tell which set of locks is correct? Click on the images to enlarge.

    II.2021.36.105.1766
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    This image of a “wading pool in Balboa.” Click on the image to enlarge.

    II.2021.36.105.5981

    A wonderful view of Gatun Locks in the center, the 1930/40s Third Locks excavation on the left, and a section of the French canal excavation on the right. Click on the image to enlarge.

    II.2021.36.105.2531

    Watch or flip through this slideshow of Carnival throughout the decades. Click on the images to enlarge.

    Or just enjoy some highlights. Click on the images to enlarge.

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    In addition to the postcard collection, in honor of the late Robert J. (Bob) Karrer, Jr., and with the generosity of his daughter Sara Lynne, we have started to digitize the important newsletter of the Isthmian Collectors Club (I.C.C. Newsletter/Journal). The Isthmian Collectors Club was created in 1975 with a focus on collecting materials related to postal history, philately materials, stamps, covers, and postcards from Panama or the Canal Zone. Their incredible journal also includes hidden histories and pieces of information related to all aspects of Canal history. As of this post, issues from 1980s-2010s are online.

    The Isthmain Collectors Club Journal logo of a compass imposed on the area of the isthmus of Panama where the Panama Canal is. The crest of the Canal and the letters 1975 are inside the compass. There is also a Republic of Panama stamp in the image.

    We would like to acknowledge the efforts of Brad Wilde and Bob Karrer for their help and for providing us with past issues of this wonderful publication.

    The Panama Canal Museum Collection also preserves Bob Karrer’s Papers which include the research materials Karrer compiled during his lifetime. His extensive collection touches on a vast and varied number of topics including military history of the Canal Zone, Canal equipment, censorship in WWII, townsites, famous visitors, important buildings in Panama and the Canal Zone, and more. He even has a small folder on unidentified flying objects in the area. His papers were a key resource when we were doing research for our blog post on Robert Fowler’s famous flight over the Panama Canal in 1914.

    Stay tuned for more updates on the new treasures to discover online thanks to our digitization campaign. A big thank you to everyone who has supported us.

    This post is part of our fall series featuring the current digitization campaign. With the support of the community PCMC has hired someone to work exclusively on scanning treasures in our collection. Over the next few months we will be sharing highlights of what we have accomplished so far. We hope you enjoy the posts and explore all the new things in the digital collection.

    1. Due to copyright restrictions some can only be viewed in detail on campus at the University of Florida, but many others are now available online in our digital collection. ↩︎
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