With the passing of mom recently, we have boxes of old cards, calendars and postcards dating to the early 1900's and late 1800's. Some of them are really cool. Is it legal for me to copy them and present them for sale as cards or prints?
Sorry for your loss. Interesting question. I also have a box old postcards from early 1900's. My great-grandmother had a pen pal in Paris and they used to swap postcards. Some are quite interesting. My understanding is that things created before 1923 are public domain. At least for the United States. Not sure about other countries though.
I'm not going to worry about legalities of copying postcards that are over 100 years old. I have some, also, that I tried to photograph to upload here, but those little dots show up. Not sure if they would scan better. Something to look into.
I've been uploading old pictures and postcards that I have. Most are 1910s or earlier. I always thought anything over 100 years old was exempt from the copyright laws but I could be wrong. I'll do it til someone with rights and proof of rights tells me to stop.
