a tiny Jumbo

It's a tiny postcard, measuring only 3½" by 1½"

but it's JUMBO! 
and I've been looking for a vintage Jumbo postcard for ages.







this is larger than the real card!

the reverse side shows the embossing

greatly enlarged

My postcard dealer from the stamp show put him aside to show me because it was a miniature. I was so excited. My first miniature and my first Jumbo (of any era).

Wikipedia lists Jumbo's occupation as 'zoo and circus attraction'. He was born in Sudan and after his mother was killed by hunters, he ended up in captivity and was shuttled between various zoos until PT Barnum bought him and he lived the next few years being the star attraction of the "Greatest Show on Earth". The world mourned when the 12' Jumbo was hit by a freight train in St Thomas, Ontario in 1885.

Reports vary on the nature of his death and what happened afterwards, but apparently Jumbo's skeleton was donated to the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. The elephant's heart was sold to Cornell University. His hide was stuffed and traveled with Barnum's circus for a number of years. In 1889, Barnum donated the stuffed Jumbo to Tufts University, where it was displayed until destroyed by a fire in 1975. Jumbo's tail, which survived the fire, is kept in the University archives. The great elephant's ashes are kept in a 14-ounce Peter Pan Crunchy Peanut Butter jar in the office of the Tufts athletic director.

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