These are Royal Trading Cards, printed by Royal Printing Company in Johnson City.
I don’t know how many were printed for this set.
Kingsport Police Department Trading Cards
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Category Archives: Kingsport TN ephemera
Batclub!
WKPT-TV kicked up its bombazine skirts in the late ’60s to get down with the bat crowd. Someone came up with this club idea.
If you joined the club, you got two things: this pin and ignored.
Flying rodents. O u kid.
Grier’s Almanac
I vaguely remember Cole (we called it Cole’s) Drug Store on Broad Street. Later, it was off Sullivan Street, next to The Little Store. It became Revco, then waved bye-bye as it decamped to Stone Drive as a CVS.
The ads in the almanac are cheerfully non-pc (“Throw Away That Truss!”) (“Eyeglasses By Mail”). Just right in your face (“Develop a He-man Voice”…buy looser underpants?).
Extract Plant and Tannery
This place only existed from 1912 to 1926. It was below what became Mead paper, which used wood pulp from this plant to, well, surprise, make paper.
The card is postally unused, but, by looking at the dates above, I would hazard a guess that it dates to the early 20s. It’s an Asheville Post Card Company issue, 54952.
Oh, hey, antique dealers? Please don’t write your price and stuff on the back of cards. I know you tell me that it can be erased. No, it can’t and it mars the card to try to do so. So, there.
Community Y
COMMUNITY “Y,” CENTER AND SHELBY STREETS, KINGSPORT, TENN.
On the back:
Pub. by T. J. Stephenson, Kingsport, Tenn.
(Plate number) 121036
Printed by Tichnor Quality Views (Boston Mass.) (here’s a link to their Tennessee issues)
Notes: This is the Shelby Street side. I remember the open porch. That part of the building was the Public Library in 1957. The rest of the building housed City Hall offices.
Earliest confirmed postmark date I have for this series is 1926. I also have post dates into the ’40s, so they hung around for quite a while.
Another Kingsport Book
Published shortly after 1962, this 9″x12″ unpaginated book was wholly a product of Kingsport. Paper by Mead, binding fabrics by Holliston Mills, and with typography, printing and binding by Kingsport Press. It was authored by Ben Haden and designed by J. Fred Wright.
The book has no copyright date, but I couldn’t find any date in the text past 1962. I assume it was produced as a promotional piece for the far-ranging Kingsport boosters (there were many). It features some interesting pictures, along with bios of the prominent men – and only men – of the time. There’s also a fine picture of Charlie Deming of WKPT-AM. Although he was basically a morning personality and sometimes sports announcer, he’s shown working a mike at the passenger side door of the station mobile unit. Marty must have been out of town…
The Kingsport Rotary Club has been a major force in keeping a published record of Kingsport as it grew. Their first 4.5″x7″ book “Kingsport Tennessee City of Industry Schools Churches Homes” (green cover) was published in 1937.
The second book “Kingsport Tennessee The Planned Industrial City” (blue cover) came out in 1946.
The third book (tan cover), with the same title as the 1946 book, was published in 1951. It was edited by Bill Freehoff, who was then with the Kingsport Times-News. (He was working in the news department at Holston Valley Broadcasting when I hired on there in 1967)
In my opinion, the best book about Kingsport’s history is Margaret Ripley Wolfe’s “Kingsport Tennessee A Planned American City” (1987, University of Kentucky Press). It can be a trifle arid at times, but she writes well and handles the material in good order.
Lest I forget: “KINGSPORT A Romance of Industry” by Howard Long, came out in 1928. Published by The Sevier Press, Kingsport, Tennessee, it’s not a scholarly piece, but is worth reading, if only for the sense of optimism that prevailed in these few years preceding the Great Depression.
At The Inn
This rather well-produced post card, from the 1940s, appears to show a recreation room at the Kingsport Inn. There are a doughty fireplace, a radio set, a piano, game boards and chairs, an American flag and ashtrays everywhere. You can just see into the next room through the door. The door to that room is open and there looks to be a window beyond the door.
I had dinner once at the Inn. I was competing in the Optimist Oratorical Contest. I didn’t win, but I had a good meal…roast beef, I think, and mashed potatoes. That I remember, but as to what vegetable or dessert was served or what the interior of the Inn actually looked like, I have no clue.
Five or six years ago, while working on some project or another, I ran into the man who had been our coach for the contest. He vaguely remembered me. “I didn’t think you’d come to be anything,” he remarked. I was a bit stung at first, then I thought, “Well, up yours, dude. I did just fine, thank you.”
This card had been mounted in a scrap book, held in place by paper corners. When the card was removed, some of the paper remained on the corners of the card.
On the back upper left is: KINGSPORT INN Kingsport, Tennessee.
It was printed by the Albertype Company in Brooklyn.
Greenwood Motel
The photo for this postcard was taken in the mid-50s, as far as I can tell.
It’s still there, more or less, but it’s for sale as of the date of this posting. In the 1959 City Directory, this motel is listed as being owned by Esther D. and Pratt A. Hegler.
On the front: (in a cursive typeface) Greenwood Motel
(sanserif) 1840 Ft. Henry Drive KINGSPORT, TENNESSEE
On the back:
(the first part is the same as on the front)
Phone CI 6-6187
On U. S. 11W – 23 Hwys.
-Kingsport’s Most Luxurious Motel –
Beautyrest Mattresses – Ceramic Tile Baths with Tubs and Showers –
Air Conditioned – Room Phones – Free 21″ TV – Wall to Wall Carpet –
Electric Heat- Room Thermostats – Shaded Grounds – Children’s Swings – Picnic Table
The card is a TichnorGloss QUALITY VIEWS. REG. U. S. PAT. OFF. MADE ONLY BY TICHNOR BROS. INC. BOSTON 15 MASS.
Plate number is G89859
Cancerama 1973
This was a tough one to scan and clean up. It’s 19.75″ by 9.75″ and, over the years, it’s gone from white to a light ecru, but not a consistent shade. Three people are on the phone in their photographs. I don’t know what to say to that.
I didn’t actually participate in this one. In a later year, I actually got tossed off the telethon because I was singing so badly and loudly. Never did fit in, never will.
Model City Motel
Here we area at 3109 Bristol Hi-way in the late 40s or early 50s. Published by Fred W. Stanley, Johnson City, Tenn. It’s a Dextone “Made Direct from Kodachrome and Ansco Color By Dexter Press, Inc. West Nyack, N.J.” Postally unused.
On the back:
MODEL CITY MOTEL
New and Strictly Modern
Located 1 1/2 miles from downtown Kingsport, Tenn. on U.S. Hi-way 11-W. Away from the city noise. For reservations, phone 4309 or write Model City Motel, 3109 Bristol Hi-way, Kingsport, Tenn. Owned and operated by Charlie Chase and James McAinch.
(The “McAinch” is a typo. It should be “McAninch”. In 1959 Charlie Chase and Bobby McAninch were listed as the owners of this bide-a-wee)
Bob Lawrence's Kingsport 