Get Ready for Christmas Card Day

The First christmas Card, the innovation of Sir Henry Cole in 1843.

Tomorrow, December 9th, is Christmas Card Day. Time to think of buying, addressing and posting your holiday greetings so they’re received in time.

The idea of sending out Christmas cards began in the mid-1800s. Sir Henry Cole ( the founder of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London) was quite popular, received lots of letters, and was constantly behind in his correspondence, especially as the holidays approached. In 1843, out of expediency, he  commissioned his friend, artist John Callcott Horsley to illustrate an idea he had for a card that would help to alleviate his holiday correspondence problem. With England’s newly created inexpensive Penny Post, he ended up with a design featuring a family toasting the holidays and had 1000 copies printed and mailed. Voila… the first commercial Christmas card. Necessity is the mother of invention.

That was in England. Now fast forward about 30 years to Louis Prang, a Prussian immigrant and lithographer/printer with a shop near Boston. Prang is recognized as the originator of the first Christmas card designed and created in the United States in 1875.

Do you still send Christmas cards? We do, though not as many as in years past. It’s a long time since the Penny Post. In 2025, it costs a whopping 78¢ to mail a card. Cost aside, we like sending and receiving cards at the holidays. I like that personal touch of handwriting a note, however short, to each recipient. One recipient said he thought it was “quaint” to receive a card by snail mail. Bah, humbug!  He doesn’t get Xmas cards from us any more.

In the past, when the kids were younger, we sometimes send ‘photo cards’. When we left to go sailing, our Christmas card sending days pretty much ended. Trying to send cards from foreign countries didn’t make sense. We began sending our digital Holiday Newsletter via email back in 2000. This year’s newsletter, if I ever get it finished, will be the 25th year we’ve shared our year with friends and family.

On a more personal note, December 9th is also Lin’s 65th birthday … my baby sister is 65? I remember a snowy December day in 1960 when my mom brought her home from the hospital and I met her for the first time. Love at first sight. Could a sister ever love a sister more? Not possible. Happy birthday, Lin!