Theda Bara

Theda Bara (July 29, 1885 – April 7, 1955), American silent film and stage actress, original, vintage, real photo postcard (RPPC). Published by Kraus Mfg. Co., New York.

Bara was one of the most popular actresses of the silent era, and one of cinema's earliest sex symbols. Her femme fatale roles earned her the nickname The Vamp (short for vampire). Bara made more than 40 films between 1914 and 1926, but most are now lost due to a fire that destroyed the majority of her films in 1937. After her marriage to Charles Brabin in 1921, she made two more feature films and retired from acting in 1926 having never appeared in a sound film.

Beginning in 1902 Kodak offered a preprinted card back that allowed postcards to be made directly from negatives. This technology allowed photographers to travel from town to town and document life in the places they visited. Local entrepreneurs hired them to record area events and the homes of prominent citizens. These postcards documented important buildings and sites, as well as parades, fires, and floods.  Real Photo postcards (RPPCs) became expressions of pride in home and community.

While Kodak was certainly the major promoter of photo postcard production, they didn't seem to originate the term "Real Photo," and used it less frequently than photographers and others in the marketplace from 1903 to ca. 1930. But it has become the popular term today to distinguish photographic postcards from commercially printed, mass-produced postcards of the same era. Real Photo postcards have made for millions of 'one-off' photographs, where the photographer may have produced a single or a small number of prints from one negative.

This vintage real photo postcard, measuring 3.5 x 5.5 inches is in  fine condition with slight signs of age and toning. Verso bears original RPPC graphics light mounting traces.