5 Questions: George Whipple

George Whipple, who lives in Philipstown, is the author of Garrison, a postcard history of the hamlet published this week by Arcadia Publishing. 

Why did you choose Garrison as a subject?
My family has lived in Putnam County for three generations. In 1999, I set up a foundation, Preserve Putnam County, and wanted to do a few good things for my home county during my lifetime. One of them was to write a book on each of the five towns. Earlier, I wrote an illustrated history of Kent and a postcard history of Carmel. When I moved to Garrison, I said, “Let’s write a postcard history of Garrison.” All proceeds are being donated to the Putnam History Museum. 

Where did you find the postcards?
I have a huge collection of Garrison postcards, as does [Philipstown Historian] Mark Forlow, the Putnam History Museum and David Lilburne at Antipodean Books on Garrison’s Landing. All four collections are represented; between us I think we have every postcard of Garrison. They’re not all in the book, of course, but we have them all. 

How did you become interested in postcards?
When I was a kid, the local drugstore would sell postcards and, because the place had been around so long, some went back to the 1910s. I have always been fascinated with postcards and depictions of Putnam County. They capture a particular time and point of view. They’re also an easy way to get all of the buildings and the history collected. If you started collecting ephemera, photographs and old newspaper ads, that would take forever. I’m a little bit of an accomplishment junkie, so I wanted to get it done. 

How did you build your collection?
If you’re a collector, eBay is the greatest tool ever invented. I used to collect Whipple family and Putnam County memorabilia by going through trays of postcards at flea markets. If I found one postcard a day, it was a miracle. If you go to eBay, you can find 100 postcards on Putnam County, and I can quickly look at them and say, “There’s one I don’t have,” which probably means it’s very rare.

What are your favorite images?
I like the postcard of the goats. Goats and sheep were a big thing in Putnam County. I like the one of Bosco’s Folly [on Route 9D], where they used to serve hamburgers and beer. It’s something you pass all the time but don’t realize it was a bar in the 1940s. There were a lot of places like that in Putnam — either things you don’t know what they were or things that have disappeared. Those are the things I really enjoy.