1899 – A historic postcard shows the restaurant at Lake Uglei in Sielbeck near Eutin in Germany, with its 600 year old giant oak. © Mark Zanzig/zanzig.com/Photo: Alb. Giesler, Eutin
The story behind the image
As you know, I’m interested in all things Ost-Holstein, the area in Northern Germany situated between Eutin, Oldenburg in Holstein, Fehmarn, and Lübeck. That’s because about quarter of my ancesters comes from here (the other half comes, more or less, from the Schleswig-Flensburg area.)
I could recently acquire this rare postcard by photo pioneer Albert Giesler in Eutin. It was sent in March 1899, so it is likely that the photo was captured in the winter of 1898/99.
The image shows the restaurant at lake Uglei in Sielbeck near Eutin in deep snow. If you look closely you can even spot the horsedrawn carriage (between the giant oak and the building.) Since 1891, the restaurant was operated by August Holzbach, the former manager of the Voss Haus in Eutin, a premium hotel situated directly at the lake.
Holzbach had been a really smart manager and started designing and selling souvenirs. Postcards would send the word of the beautiful space (in the middle of nowhere) into the world. Even back then, a beautiful spot was not enough any longer. He had been looking for a unique feature that would attract visitors. He found it in the giant oak in front of the building. It was said to be 600 years old, 30 meters tall with a tree trunk of 5 meters circumference.
By the way, I left the blue color tone of the postcard print as published by Giesler. I converted it to a genuine black and white image but came to the conclusion that Giesler got it right (and I got it wrong.) His blue toned image looks sooo much better than this variant… 🙂
Design ideas
The high resolution image
| Capture Date | Winter 1898/1899 |
| Photographer | Alb. Giesler, Eutin |
| Location | Eutin, Germany |
| Image Source | 9.2 x 14 cm postcard |
| Digital Image Source | EPSON Perfection 4870 Photo |
| Digital Image Source Format | TIFF, 16 bits/pixel, grayscale |
| Edited Image Format | JPEG, 24 bits/pixel, sRGB |
| Edited Image Dimensions | 5071 x 3365 Pixels |
| Copyright | Mark Zanzig/zanzig.com/Photo: Alb. Giesler |
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