Illinois Postcard Lost in 1953 Finally Delivered 72 Years Later

A postcard frozen in time

Alan Ball is 88 now, but imagine being contacted out of nowhere about something you sent off when you were a teenager. That's your literal past showing up in the mail decades later, saying, "Hello, remember me?". All it does show is that time really moves fast, and something as small as a misplaced postcard flying back to us can be a good reminder.

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How it was finally discovered

Everyone loves to give the post office a hard time, but this one really does fall into the "it got lost in the system" mythology of the department. The fact that it might've slipped into a crevice at the post office and remained hidden there for decades is something else. It's like out of a movie, or at the very least, a sitcom. It also makes you wonder what else is hiding in the other, less visible corners of different post offices.

Look at the postcard sent from New York to his parents in Ottawa HERE.

Small-town surprise in Ottawa, Illinois

Ottawa isn't too far from Rockford, and it's the center of the story for this time-traveling postcard. These incredible stories are the reason why you don't always need big cities to come up with something amazing. Big things happen in small towns. Talking to Shaw Local from his home in Sandpoint, Idaho, Ball said, “I’ll be doggoned...It’s a beautiful day here. You just made it more beautiful.”

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Other lost mail stories around the world

It's not the first time this has happened either. A 121-year-old postcard was recently unearthed in Wales. What if an 80-year-old package of yours from Amazon suddenly appears? Will your grandkids be opening up a box of socks with a note attached that says it was "delayed in transit?" Personally, I'd take a postcard any day over socks.