Diderick A. den Bakker
03-19-2014, 05:36 AM
The Imagerie d'Epinal models (see my other thread for items for sale) lend themselves excellently to rigorous scaling down. I scanned the Semaphore, Grande Construction 292, original size ca. 49x39 cm, and printed it on 20x25 cms - so one quarter the original. Building was no problem - in a simple model like this one doesn't even need the indications, which of course become difficult to read at this size. However, there is also the large computer image to refer back to when in doubt.
As followers of my remarks on vintage items know, I always like to find out a bit more about the subject. The semaphore system (at first called telegraph) was invented ca. 1795, and used to send short messages over a long distance. Remember the story in The Count of Monte Christo?! It consisted of a mast with movable arms.
For communication with ships a mast was added which could show combinations of balls, triangles and flags, so that fairly complex weather and tide warnings could be sent. There several along the Dutch coast as early as 1800. From 1860 onwards they were also built along the French coast - the postcard dates from 1905. (And yes, in those days the stamp was attached to the front of the card - in France, at least).
Of course they became obsolete with the introduction of radio and radio-telephone communication. I remember one still functioning at Hook of Holland in the 'fifties, but it has long since disappeared.
Comparing the model with the postcard shows that Epinal is sometimes impressionistic rather than accurate. The construction of the yard arm could have been better...
As followers of my remarks on vintage items know, I always like to find out a bit more about the subject. The semaphore system (at first called telegraph) was invented ca. 1795, and used to send short messages over a long distance. Remember the story in The Count of Monte Christo?! It consisted of a mast with movable arms.
For communication with ships a mast was added which could show combinations of balls, triangles and flags, so that fairly complex weather and tide warnings could be sent. There several along the Dutch coast as early as 1800. From 1860 onwards they were also built along the French coast - the postcard dates from 1905. (And yes, in those days the stamp was attached to the front of the card - in France, at least).
Of course they became obsolete with the introduction of radio and radio-telephone communication. I remember one still functioning at Hook of Holland in the 'fifties, but it has long since disappeared.
Comparing the model with the postcard shows that Epinal is sometimes impressionistic rather than accurate. The construction of the yard arm could have been better...