Jenny Nyström — Children's Train Game in a Swedish Village, 1909

In a Swedish village street in 1909, a line of children play at being a steam train — one engine, the rest carriages, imagination doing all the engineering. A building in the background advertises Liljeholmens Stearinljus, the famous Swedish candle manufacturer, grounding the scene firmly in time and place. Nyström's signed illustration captures early 20th-century childhood play at its most exuberant. From the Jenny Nyström collection — a charming historical card for Scandinavian art lovers and postcrossers who appreciate a good period detail.