AngDesign

Revd Edward Bradley

Soon after Sir Henry Cole's idea was initiated by other people who were keen to follow in his footsteps.  Two years later in 1845, the Revd Edward Bradley sent a Christmas card to his friends. This card was lithographed by Lambert of Newcastle, and although it was originally intended for private use, in 1847 it was marketed for general sale.

Almost straight away more and more people were designing cards, some time before 1846 Thomas Sturrock and one of his friends, Charles Drummand, from Leith in Scotland designed a New Year card.  Then in 1848, William Maw EgIey (I 826 - 1916), designed his card, which was not unlike the card designed by John C. Horsley as it was divided up in a very similar way with the use of vine leaves etc.

Colour

Colour was introduced into Christmas cards during the 1850's.  By this time Christmas and New Year cards were being produced in a very large scale, and the message written upon them. It was George Baxter who was responsible for the development of colour printing.  By 1 870 Christmas greetings in colour were also printed on the backs of the Post Office half penny postcards.  These were published by John S. Day, of Savoury Street, Strand, London, and due to this soon after the first government postal cards come in the USA during 1873.  American Greetings card manufacturers began publishing Christmas and New Year cards on the backs of these.

Louis Prang

Louis Prang moved to New York in April 1850, from Germany, he set up business at a plant in Roxbury, a suburb in Boston.  He moved to New York due to the failure of the 1848 Revolutions in Europe.  In 1856 Louis Prang set up as a lithographer with Joseph Mayer, in Boston, but in 1860 Prang and Mayer went their separate ways, and so L. Prang & Co. was established. 

Prang invented a system of colour printing from zinc plates, instead of printing from the lithographic stone that was usually used.

“I have used zinc plates for nearly all my colour plates since 1873, and am positive that I have saved thereby fifty thousand dollars”

In 1880 Louis Prang launched a Christmas card competition with a first prize of 1,000 Dollars. One of the judges for this competition was Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848 - 1933), who was known during 1893, due to his production of Favrile Glass in New York.

Over the years Louis Prang's cards changed a lot, during the years of 1875 - 1879, most of his cards which were produced were small, single cards, which were only printed on the one side, usually they had pictures of fruit, flowers or birds, though black backgrounds were becoming more and more popular.  The size of these cards were between (31/2x 2 in, or 4 x 2 1/2 in).

However by the late 1870's Louis Prang's cards were becoming more and more elongated usually between these sizes (5 1/2 x 2 3/4 in, or 6 3/4 in x 2 1/4 in), and he introduced his large cards during the 1880's, these were approximately (6 x 8 in, or 7 x 10 in) in size. Louis Prang had many different artists working for him, these included 0. E. Whitney, who was the designer of some of the early floral cards, Rosina Emmett (winner of the first prize in 1881).  Will H. Low, Thomas Moron and Henry Sandham. Prang's business is said to have continued until 1895, when there was very tough competition from Germany.