Mail Call From The 1940s

While watching an episode of Unsolved Mysteries circa 1988 (as one does), I came across a story about V-mail from World War II. Short for "Victory Mail," it was a process used by the United States in which mail was sorted, photographed, and turned into microfilm. The microfilm was shipped where it needed to go, then printed and delivered. The whole process could turn thousands of pounds of mail into something much smaller and easier to shlep around the world. Wikipedia even has a comic that explains the process. (The United Kingdom had a similar "Airgraph" system.)

Learning about this immediately sparked a bunch of different ideas I could incorporate into various tabletop RPGs, from GURPS WWII (obviously) to a 1950s-based game, long-lost supers ephemera, tales of modern-day weirdness, and more. I also liked my odds of being able to recreate the look and feel of a piece of "V-mail" on my own printers. Whether you want a different MacGuffin or a new exposition method, the latest innovation might be 80+ years old . . .

-- Steven Marsh