Five people pose outside a low sod house, two seated in front and three standing behind them. The building fills nearly the entire width of the photograph. Horizontal courses of sod, tall narrow windows and a doorway near the meeting of the two wings are clearly visible beneath the broad, uneven turf roof.
A dog rests beside the left-hand window. Detached wooden frames lean against the wall and lie on the right-hand roof slope, while a long slatted wooden structure stretches across the bare foreground. A single tree rises behind the roofline.
“No Place Like Home” appears in white handwriting within the photograph, apparently carried in the negative. The reverse credits “PHOTO MADE BY S. D. BUTCHER & SON, KEARNEY, NEB.” Kearney is the maker’s address; the card does not identify the house’s location or name the five people.
The real photo postcard has a divided back and a KRUXO stamp box printed “One Cent Stamp Here.” It bears no correspondence, address, stamp or postmark. Pencil price and stock notations appear along the upper reverse. Neither the exposure date nor the date of this postcard printing is stated.
- Title on card
- No PLACe LiKe HOMe (inscribed)
- Medium
- RPPC
- Subject
- Outdoor Scene, Soddy, Solomon Butcher
- Dimensions
- 5.55 × 3.48 in (141.0 × 88.5 mm)
- Condition
- A long, fine pale line crosses the lower foreground, below the figures; the scans do not establish whether this is a surface mark or one reproduced from the negative. Otherwise sound, with no major tear or loss visible.
- Provenance
- Dated c. 1907–1920s by the KRUXO stamp box on the back (paper-maker ranges per Playle's and Postcard Origins stamp-box references; the box dates the paper, not the exposure). Never mailed.
- Catalogue no.
- MRPPC3453
Catalogue details
Location
S. D. Butcher & Son studio, Kearney, Nebraska · Kearney, Nebraska, United States
Photographer's studio address — not the scene · Locality (town) · 60% confidence
The back reads "PHOTO MADE BY S. D. BUTCHER & SON, KEARNEY, NEB." That is the studio's town. The card does not say where this sod house stood, so this is not a photo location. The house still needs to be identified.
Source: Card imprint (direct): PHOTO MADE BY S. D. BUTCHER & SON, KEARNEY, NEB.
