The Christmas theme is commonplace in the age of antique postcards, but rather elusive by comparison in the world of moderns. It exists, thought, and may actually be more common than you might have imagined. The presence of moderns easily spans more than half a century, so it's only natural that the Christmas holiday season has made a notable impact during this period. You just have to look a little harder to find them. This column will cover some of the cards from the past twenty-five or so years.
Classico San Francisco began issuing postcards in the early 1980s and has offered several different groups featuring the Christmas theme; Saturday Evening Post covers, Anne Geddes babies and children, Magic- Eye 3-D, and Holiday Greetings.
Norman Rockwell illustrations adorn many Saturday Evening Post covers from over the years. Several feature classic Santa designs such as the December 2, 1922 "Santa's Helpers ", the December 4, 1920 "Checking His List", the December , 1928 "Merrie Christmas" (pictured),
the December 21, 1935 "Dear Santa" in which he reads letters at his desk, and the December 17, 1938 "The Christmas Goose"(pictured). Anne Geddes is a famous photographer of babies and children, typically using clever props in unusual situations. Nearly 200 of her photo works have appeared on Classico cards, including the Twelve Days of Christmas and several others with a holiday motif. These are truly unique postcards!
Magic-Eye 3-D cards are tricky to impossible for many to see. When viewed correctly, a three-dimensional image appears from out of an otherwise non-descript, thought perhaps colorful design. Classico issued over 200 of these once-immensely popular designs, including over twenty holiday images such as Trees, Presents, Victorian Santas, Stockings, Stars, Deer, Snowflakes, Bells & Hearts, Sleighs, Bearing Gifts, Peace, Soldiers, Angels, plus another dozen or so designs. These cards are fun!
The Classico Holiday Series contains thirty-six cute illustrations of birds and animals (dogs under the mistletoe, kissing pigs, polar baer with Santa cap in a wreath, ice-skating rabbit),
several Santas, several cartoon-like reindeer, dolls, a teddy bear, a holiday wreath and much more. These are rather like greeting cards, but without the sentiment.
Irenco Robert Bier AB, of Stockholm, Sweden issued a sizeable number of Santas, Angels and children in two groups of "Good Old Days" repros of images from 1900. Many cards were printed on foil stock, which seems to allow the images to change as they are moved about in the light. The remainder are printed on stock with a chrome finish. For those who want the nostalgic holiday images, but at the considerably-less cost of moderns, these are the cards to seek.
Amongst the thousands of black & white postcard images proliferated by Fotofolio, some rather unusual Santas were produced including, among others, the A295 Santa Claus feeding dolpins, the A296 Santa Claus on water skis, the A431 Sidewalk Santa, Louisville, Kentucky, MM20 Paragould, Arkansas (boy in Santa costume), the MP191 Santa on New York City subway, the P360 Sid Caeser (in Santa suit) & Imogene Coca, the X378 Father Christmas comes to Grief, St. Moritz, and Z46 a color image of Santa's face painted o a window of the Blue Moon Bar, on Park Avenue, New York City.
Greeting card companies such as Hallmark Cards, American Greetings and Gibson have routinely issued holiday postcards both as singles and in tear-out booklets of ten to twelve cards.
Argus Communications issued numerous holiday cards of Garfield and his gang. The USPS nearly always issues cards picturing their holiday stamps.
Over the years postcard printers and distributors have published their own holiday cards. Terrell Publishing printed a series of six Merry Christmas and Holiday Greetings cards with generic images. Penrod/Hiawatha did a twelve-card series of Michigan scenes within the shapes of Christmas ornaments. Nu-Vista Prints has put out a a number of a Cleveland cards for the holidays including Holiday & Season's Greetings, Hanukkah Greetings and Happy New Year. Others show views of the downtown decorated for the holidays, even a forty-foot poinsetta tree in the Beechwood Place shoopping center. White House Publishing did cards of Christmas carolers and a Santa face over the downtown Cincinnati skyline.
Several theme parks have issued cards appropriate for the holidays, especially Santa's Workshop, the North Pole, and New York. Dozens of cards pertaining to Santa, his helpers and reindeer, and a Nativity Pageant are featured. Santa Claus, Indiana is the home of the holiday world. Santa appears on cards and can be visited every day of the year.
Holiday cards have been made of the White House National Christmas Tree, New York's decorated Rockefeller Center, a tumbleweed Christmas Tree in Chandler, Arizona, Kansas City's Crown Center, downtown Wakeeney, Kansas and Whitefish, Montana, Oregon's Shakespeare Theatre at Ashland and Shore Acres State Park near Coos Bay, Santas from Leavenworth & Shelton, Washington, Frankenmuth, Michigan at night, a lone Christmas tree along San Diego's coast, The Railroad Dining Co. near Mt. Rainer, and so much more. There is a Santa pictured on a fruit crate label. Just look and you will find
Modern holiday cards will probably never command the prices as to the antique issues, but their real value is in the quest to find them. Most of the cards mentioned in this column are in the 25 to 50 cent range, with the harder to find or special printings in the one to three dollar range.