By now just about everybody has their share of Christmas cards – both sent and received. I am told that the “sent” and “received” are supposed to be equal, and if a tally shows otherwise then some will wreak woe on whoever caused the inequality – particularly if it is on the received side. However, The Blonde in the house has a humongous “send” list while I have a much smaller one. Neither of us care how the equality comes out as it is just fun to send them and even more to receive them.
Now as you all probably know the founder of the Christmas card was John Calcott Horsley who was commissioned by Sir Henry Cole in 1843 to make a Christmas card – which he did. The card showed a prosperous family enjoying the season, but it included a small boy drinking wine. That did not go over so well as that was a “corruption of youth”. (Apparently they had corrupted youth back then too). That ticked Horsley off so he did not make one the next year. However, in subsequent years he did, while making certain not to show wine swilling youth on any of the cards.
As you may have surmised Horsley was an Englishman. A thirty year period then arose when Americans had to swallow their pride and buy Christmas cards from their former overlords. There were no Christmas card manufacturers in this country. However, help eventually arrived in the person of an immigrant German by the name of Louis Prang. He is known as the “Father of American Christmas Cards”. I bet you do not read that in any high school history books today. Fame is fleeting and fickled! In any case he started making them in 1875 after borrowing $250 – not certain from whom or where, but a paper manufacturer is a good guess. In any case by 1881 he was spitting out 5 million a year.
He was soon joined by other card makers including Joyce Hall in the early 1900’s. With his (note the “his”) brothers Bill and Rollie, they soon made a mark in the industry that lasts until today. Now you can buy as many as you want – for pretty high prices especially if you are purchasing them. The other option is use the computer and make them yourself which is what I do. The agreement in our family is that I make them, and The Blonde writes them. This works well, and I have recommended it several times at meetings of Husbands United (a secret society).
There are other cards, of course, and apparently the earliest ones revolved around Valentine’s Day. One that has been carefully preserved in a museum somewhere dates back to the 1400’s. Naturally, they were most popular in France. All the nobles had them made for various ladies of their acquaintance – or ones with whom they wanted to become acquainted. Apparently the nobles found them rewarding and so they have been distributed – with varying results – for centuries now.
Finally, you may wonder why it took so long to create greeting cards. The reason for that goes back into the mists of time. Certain folks like to point out that there are cave drawings that they claim show visiting aliens. They use that to point out that we are not “Alone!”. Nothing could be further from the truth. Actually, they were early man’s attempt to paint a picture of their wives as an anniversary gift (St. Valentine had not been born yet). Apparently the wives were not impressed with what we would call today avant-garde art. Thus, for thousands of years it was in men’s DNA not to use art to woo the distaff side. Candy wasn’t available most of the time either so cards had to finally be invented.
Believe me, you can Google this.
Barry Evans writes about Life in The Villages for Villages-News.com