1878 Louis Prang Christmas card9th Day of Christmas Trivia:
In 1875, Massachusetts printer Louis Prang became the first printer to offer cards in America. For more than 30 years prior, Americans had to import greeting cards from England. Prang, a German immigrant to the US, opened a lithographic shop with $250 and published the first line of American Christmas cards. These first cards pictured flowers, plants, and children and contained simple greetings of the season. Therefore, he is sometimes called the "father of the American Christmas card."
By 1881, Prang was producing more than five million Christmas cards each year.
Prang’s firm made high quality, artistic Christmas cards. By 1890 the market Louis Prang was instrumental in developing was flooded with cheap imitations. Prang refused to lower his standards and decided not to compete in the new marketplace. He quit producing Christmas cards soon after 1890.
Forty years later, in 1915, John C. Hall and two of his brothers got into the card business when they established Hallmark Cards.
Forty years later, in 1915, John C. Hall and two of his brothers got into the card business when they established Hallmark Cards.
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