The tradition of giving Christmas cards to acquaintances, friends, and family along is one that is deeply entrenched in lots of people around the globe. In reality, there are a lot of people that give also Christmas cards for their co-workers, supervisors as well as clients as a gesture of goodwill through the christmas season. But where did the thought of giving cards at Christmastime result from?
new year cardIn the U.S., handmade Christmas cards were exchanged face-to-face early on in the country's history, after which later through the U.S. Postal Service. By 1822, many handmade greetings appeared to be sent through the mail; in reality, there were a lot of the Superintendent of Mails tried, unsuccessfully, to petition Congress to limit the amount of cards that might be sent through the mail.
John Calcott Horsley, a British illustrator, printed the first commercial Christmas card for Sir Henry Cole in 1843. Sir Henry Cole wanted something he could send to relatives and buddies, and professional colleagues along with other acquaintances, to need them the blessings of the season, a way of saying Merry Christmas after a little more than spoken words.
A thousand of those three-panel cards, that have images of a family enjoying the Christmas holiday around an evening meal table full of food in the center, as well as other people performing charitable works, including giving clothing to homeless people, about the front and back, were printed and sold, which makes it the first publicly sold Christmas card ever.
Prepaid cards quickly became very popular both in England and Germany; however, it was not until the 1870s that commercially printed cards made their method to the U.S. A printer named Louis Prang started mass-producing Christmas cards around that point in order that the person with average skills could afford to purchase them and mail them.
In 1915, a person named Joyce C. Hall, regarding his brothers, created Hallmark for the purpose of marketing and selling handmade cards, that has been such a success that a mere 3 years later these were also marketing their particular type of gift wrap. In 1932 they patented what they called Eye-Vision, that has been putting cards out on display racks so people may even see them before choosing them. These were the pioneers in displaying handmade cards by doing this.
Christmas card designs tended to improve with respect to the times, for example spoofs about the impoverished condition of several people throughout the Great Depression, and Santa Claus carrying a united states Flag during WWII. In 1954, Americans sent 2 billion Christmas cards like a personal and heartfelt method of saying Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays.
Today, the time stands at a minimum of 4 billion, with the average person broadcasting about twenty cards, however, many people send out greater than twenty, including 62,824 submitted in twelve months by Werner Erhard of San Francisco. Critics blame people like him for the purpose they see being a waste of income and paper, however, the tradition just isn't slowing, and therefore unlikely to get rid of in the near future.