Here’s when the Christmas season really gets underway: one wintry day, amongst the deluge of bills and ads, your daily mail coughs up something out of the ordinary. Maybe it’s an envelope dotted with stenciled snowflakes. Maybe there’s a grinning snowman on an address label. But you know, even before opening it, exactly what you’ve received. It’s your first Christmas card. Let the holidays begin!

Commercially-produced Christmas cards first came to us courtesy of Sir Henry Cole, director of London’s Victoria & Albert Museum.

Cole had a tradition of sending handwritten holiday greetings to family and friends, but by 1843 the list was lengthy. Inspiration struck: he commissioned John Calcott Horsley, a member of the Royal Academy, to create a card that could be lithographed and colored by hand. “Extras” in the initial printing of 1,000 were then made available for sale to the general public.

Horsley’s 3” x 5” card illustrated three scenes: A family enjoying a holiday toast filled the central panel; the side panels featured folks performing charitable acts. The cards were roundly condemned, however, because one figure shown sipping wine in the central panel was a child. They were quickly withdrawn from the market; today, only about a dozen remain.

Over the next several years, the custom of card exchange grew in popularity, although initially only the wealthy could afford them. Then, thanks to the use of less costly paper and the development of the steam printing press, production costs plummeted. And, thanks to England’s Postal Act of 1840, even mailing a Christmas card was extremely affordable: postage was just a penny to anywhere in the United Kingdom.

In the United States, those sending “season’s greetings” had to make do with imported cards until 1875. That’s when Louis Prang, the “Father of the American Christmas Card,” began to sell them domestically. Prang’s “chromos” utilized zinc plates, which proved much less expensive than previous methods of color printing. The Christmas card tradition caught on here just as quickly as it had overseas; by the 1880s, Prang produced nearly five million cards annually.

By the 1920s, the Christmas card thematic pattern had become well-established, offering up a unique blend of nostalgia, sentiment, and season-specific visuals. Holiday wishes became particularly poignant during World War II, as greetings were sent to those overseas, keeping morale high, both at home and abroad.