A Lost New York Postcard Resurfaces After 72 Years

Imagine dropping a postcard in a New York mailbox back in 1953, expecting it to reach your parents within the week. Instead, it takes the scenic route, disappearing for more than seven decades before landing in the hands of a completely different post office.

That’s exactly what happened to Alan Ball, who was just a teenager when he mailed a simple postcard home. In 2025, long after his parents had passed, the card finally resurfaced at a post office in Ottawa, Illinois, stunning everyone involved.

From New York to Nowhere: A Postcard Misplaced

The postcard, stamped and sent from New York, featured the United Nations building which was brand new at the time and a popular symbol of hope and progress in the post-war years.

Somewhere along the way, the card slipped out of circulation. Some believe it may have been misplaced within the U.N.’s busy mailroom, while others think it was accidentally set aside and forgotten in storage. Whatever the reason, it lay hidden for decades until a sharp eyed postal worker stumbled across it in a bundle of undelivered mail.

Tracing a 72-Year-Old Postcard Back to Its Sender

The unusual find caught the attention of the Ottawa postmaster, who was determined to track down its original sender. He reached out to local genealogists, who treated the task like a puzzle from the past. With only a name and handwriting to go on, they managed to trace the postcard back to Dr. Alan Ball, now living in Idaho. When shown the message, Ball confirmed the handwriting was his, even though the postcard itself had slipped from memory.

Get our free mobile app

Postcard Unlocks Memories of a Teen’s Journey

Back then, Ball was just 16 years old, traveling during the summer and likely making his way toward Puerto Rico. Like many teenagers with a sense of wonder, he decided to send a quick note to his parents back home. While he no longer remembers the exact words he wrote, holding that postcard again unlocked a flood of memories of the trip, of the excitement of being young and away from home, and of a different time in both his life and the world.