Dialogue with an old postcard. The publishing program ‘Province in an old postcard’: experience and methodology

The article finalizes the thirty-year program "Province in an old postcard" for the publication of 16 unique illustrated books dedicated to 40 towns, manors and cities of the Vladimir province, including Vladimir, Gorokhovets, Gus-Khrustalny, Vyazniki, Ivanovo-Voznesensk, Kovrov, Murom, Yuryev-Polsky, Pereslavl-Zalessky, Shuya, as well as the cities of Nizhny Novgorod, Kaluga, Elisavetgrad (now Kropyvnytsky). The author courageously describes the methodology of old postcards research, the principles of creating books on similar subjects, on which the depth of knowledge of the still little-studied, thinnest, but very informative layer of our history of two decades of 19 - early of the 20th century depends. It also resulted in the first in the history of philocarty "Encyclopedia of postcards with views of cities and towns of the Vladimir province until 1918".