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FeedJan 25, 201201:36 PM
A Very Mysterious Postcard from 1909
I like a good mystery as much as the next fellow, but this one has me stumped.
My pal Paul Craig recently sent me a scan of a rather battered old postcard, with this message: "I recently won an eBay auction for a very odd and unusual postcard. The front [a view of Main Street] isn't very interesting. The back, however, certainly is. Have you ever seen anything like this?"
No, Paul, I haven't. The message seems to be a complicated mix of mathematical symbols and Greek letters. Is it a message? A code? A math equation? It certainly reminds me of secret codes the Lauderdales used during the war, between the American branch of the family, and the relatives who stayed behind in Switzerland, but that's about as far as I got with it.
The postcard itself offers a few clues, but not much to go on. We certainly don't know much about the sender. As you can see from the postmark, it was mailed from Memphis on November 20, 1909. For some reason, the one-cent stamp is affixed upside down, and I don't know if that has any significance.
The card is addressed to Mr. George Cooper James, who was living at 779 Adams, in Memphis. A look through old city directories tells me that James was a student at the "University School," which is how Memphis University School was often identified in its early days. I presume that James must have been a grown-up student, because the city directories list him as the only person living at 779 Adams — there's no mention of parents or other family members.
I think this card is some secret coded message between friends, who would surely be amazed — if not downright mortified — that people more than 100 years later are scrutinizing it.
Anyway, here you go. If anybody knows what "language" this is, let me know. Even better, tell me what it says.
Ask Vance is the blog of Vance Lauderdale, the award-winning columnist of Memphis magazine and MBQ: Inside Memphis Business. Vance is the author of two books: Ask Vance: The Best Questions and Answers from Memphis Magazine's History and Trivia Expert (2003), as well as Ask Vance: More Questions and Answers from Memphis Magazine's History Expert (2011). He is also the recipient of quite a few nice awards, the creator of several eye-catching wall calendars, and the only person we know with a vintage shock-treatment machine in his den. 
Reader Comments:
Curiouser and Curioser, perhaps they were testing each other on codes, especially sending it within town? Tolkien used to make up characters like this too. Doubt it is math since the pi symbol appears several times two together, you wouldn't have "Pi Pi" So perhaps it is being used as an O or E where there might be two together? I think the semicolon is separating words, the periods/dots are too obvious to be periods, I think they are supposed to be a letter. I would have the boffins at Bletchley Park run it through the Enigma code but ever since I was disowned by MI6 I lost my clearance
I may be mistaken, but it seems it looks a lot like the code used by the Zodiac serial killer. I have not seen the documentary on him in awhile, but I believe I remember seeing some of the same symbols in his communications. I also wonder if there was a lodge or secret organization like the Mason's who had their own code, or maybe a fraternity of some type. I intend to look at some of the Zodiac letters. I believe they are online.
My sister used to write in made up "language" that looked something like this. Each symbol was a letter of the alphabet. I'd bet it was just a couple of buddies trying their hand at code-cracking. That or a government conspiracy. Good luck finding out!
Carefully steam the stamp off. An upside down stamp is sometimes a signal that there is information underneath. There might be a clue under the stamp.
"Dear Cooper, When are you going to write to an old friend? How are your mother and father, hope you are all well and having a good time."
It doesn't have any punctuation or separation of words, and "write" is even broken up on separate lines. I don't know the bottom 3 characters... might be a key for a shared code book, or it might be the sender's initials or something like that. If it's part of the message, then the middle one is M, and last one might be G, if it didn't have a closed top.
Anyway, it's a substitution cipher, which means one character represents a letter. What makes it hard on this one is that they have 2 characters that both look like pi, one with a round top is O and one with a flat top is H. Also the character at the end of the second line with the closing parenthesis... the closing parenthesis is part of that character. Some of the dots are P, but an open parenthesis with a dot is a Y.
-Tim
Actually, this was a communication between aliens from the planet Ashtar-πض¶358. It was signed Zok. Just more proof that the government is hiding aliens from us.
Tim's comment seems to be on-track. at first I thought it might be Cherokee or some mathematical symbols ...
~Ryan
signature #.7.€. = J.C.G
it is his initials
Found something http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2011/10/translation-algorithms-used-to-crack-centuries-old-secret-code.ars
but Tim is right.
Sticking the stamp up side down on a postcard means I love you.