Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Esther Howland Valentine Card

Esther Howland Valentine Card 1850 AD

The above image shows a Valentine card produced by Esther Howland in 1850 AD that has the message, "Weddings now are all the go, will you marry me or no". This is a public domain image and you are free to use the above classic beauty of a card by downloading or saving the image to your hard disk.

As Leigh Eric Schmidt, a writer in Graham's American Monthly, observed in 1849 that Saint Valentine's Day had become a national holiday in the United States. The first mass-produced Valentines of embossed paper lace were produced and sold in the United States, shortly after 1847 by Esther Howland of Worcester, Massachusetts. Esther Howland took her inspiration for producing the cards from an English Valentine card she had received. The practice of sending Valentine's cards had existed in England before it became popular in North America. Since 2001, the U.S. Greeting Card Association has been giving an annual "Esther Howland Award for a Greeting Card Visionary."

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

What makes you think this is a public domain image? This is a card in my private collection.

Unknown said...

Having a copy in your collection does not make you the owner of the copyright for the work of the publisher, designer and creator of the card!
Read the reasons why this card is in public domain here.