By the Library Committee
It is difficult to say when the first Christmas card was sent, but is reputed that the first card was sent in 1845 by W.C. Dobson who was one of Queen Victoria’s favorite painters. He sent his friends lithograph copies.
In 1846 John Calcott Horsley, who was a member of the Royal Academy, designed a card for Sir Henry Cole. Sir Henry was too busy to write letters to his friends, so he had Horsley produce a card.
By 1874 Louis Prang, who was an exile following the German Revolution and the founder of L. Prang and Company, started to print cards in Roxbury, Mass.
Christmas cards have come a long way since those first lithographs.
The newest way to send Christmas cards is via the Internet. If you want to send free electronic greeting cards, this site will give you a large selection of links: rats2u.com/calendar_ed/calendar_christmas.htm#christmas.
Several good links are 123 Greetings, which is a free, quick and easy electronic greeting service. Another is Awesome Cyber Cards where you can create your own Christmas card. It gives you 17 different animated or musical pictures and the form to personalize your card.
Blue Mountain Arts’ is another site where you can send personalized musical cards.
This year you have no excuse not to send Christmas cards. All you have to do is sit down at your computer and click away.
(This feature was prepared by a committee in IVCC’s Jacobs Library.)
12/10/98