Gorky - A Closed Soviet City

I have mentioned previously that places which have changed their names will feature in this blog. Nearly all of these places, including today's, will be from the former USSR.
Gorky was the name given to Nizhny Novgorod from 1932 until 1990 when it reverted back to its original name.
I'm actually quite surprised to find that these cards exist as from the end of the Second World War until the dissolution of the USSR, Gorky was one of the Soviet Union's many closed cities.
Westerners were not allowed to enter the city, meaning it was used as a place of exile for Soviet dissidents such as Andrei Sakharov.
The town did not appear on any maps and although it was a popular tourist spot for many Russians, street maps were not sold until the mid 1970s which makes it all the more surprising that this set of postcards(some of which have street names on the back), published in 1973 exist.

This one depicts a good view of one of the entry points of the town which could have proved dangerous should it have fallen into the wrong hands.

Here we have the station which would have been another strategic position.

Here we have some later ones from 1982, one showing the Kremlin and another showing popular department store "Children's World" None of the cards have been sent, which is a shame as it would have been interesting to know who bought and received the cards.

Unlike some cities since the dissolution, the Lenin Statue does still stand, though it was nearly destroyed by a man last year who managed to tear off the left arm before being stopped by police.

Canadian Pacific

Happy New Year everyone. 
The January blues are  reality for many of us and I know a lot of people like to think of getting away during  these times so I thought I would take a look at a couple of airline issued postcards this week.
Aeronautica and postcards do seem to go hand in hand, perhaps because they are both associated with holidays. I do know people who have amassed large collections solely of plane related cards. I'm not one of those but I do quite like airline related cards.
You don't tend to see airline issued postcards anymore. I don't know if it is a security issue or if postcards just are n't  considered a good method of advertising anymore. While modern ones don't seem to exist, vintage ones are not hard to find. 
Today's card is an advert for Canadian Pacific airlines. While searching for further information about them I did notice that items relating to them seem  very collectable. Canadian Pacific airlines were founded in 1942 and operated flights all over the world, pioneering the polar route to the Far East. They were renamed CP Airlines in 1968 until 1986 then reverted back to their original  name before being taken over by PWA a year later. The merged airlines were renamed Canadian Airlines before they too were taken over and merged into the still extant Air Canada.
There is no date on the card below but judging by the fashion I would say early 60s.

Now, I don't normally advertise in my blog but it would be remiss of me not to mention that the card above is from https://postcardinalclub.com/
If you're stuck for a gift for the postcard lover in your life or if, like me, you want to get something cheerful in the post then you can subscribe to get one or two vintage cards monthly or a single one off card.