Glückliches Neues Jahr

Here are some ornate German New Year's cards. These were the cards that the Schweigert family sent to Adolf Stoltz in 1911, 1912, and 1913.  They were sent from Markirchen, Germany, which appears to be the town that Adolf emigrated from.  He settled in Lawrence, Massachusetts with his family and the Lutz family sometime around the turn of the century.

Albert Schweigert must have been a very good friend of Adolf's, because I have a lot of postcards that he sent. Adolf appears to have tried to fit them in an album of limited size, so some of the cards have been trimmed. It's a shame, but they're still beautiful.

Here are the backs of the cards in the same order.

I won't transcribe all three cards, since they don't relay any great news. The message on the one above reads:

Dear friend I wish you and your mother a happy New Year. Everything good, everything beautiful. Heartfelt greetings from Schweigert.

Heureuse Année

More French New Year's postcards. Tomorrow I'll post some beautiful German ones.

 

Here are the backs of the cards in the same order.

Bonne Année

I have so many old French New Year's postcards, so I'm going to try to post as many as I can.

Here are the backs of the cards, which are almost as beautiful as the fronts.

The New Year and Clocks

There are a number of symbols that are associated with the New Year. One of my favorites is the image of a clock striking midnight. Here are some classic examples.

These cards were all produced by Raphael Tuck & Sons. Here are the backs of the cards in the same order.

 

New Year's Calendars

It's hard to believe that this new year's calendar is 100 years old.

This one's from 1911.

Here are the backs of the cards in the same order.

Happy New Year from Walter P. Smith, Mail Carrier

How I would love to get a card like this from my mail carrier!

And while we're talking about mail, here's another card that mentions the U.S. Postal service in terms of New year's Greetings.

The back of the first card is blank. here's the back of the second one.

The message sent to Mr. and Mrs. Chauncey Hawkins of Susquehanna, Pennsylvania in 1909 reads:

Dear friends

May this Xmas be a joyous one for you both. Wish you could be here with Bertha and I. We are having such a good visit. With love Emily

Dutch Christmas

I love the graphics and the colors on these--and any picture with ices skaters wins my favor.
Have a very merry Christmas.

 

The backs of the cards all look the same, though only one has any writing on it.

What Santa Does in His Spare Time

You may have wondered what Santa does when he's not delivering presents. Here's your answer. He likes to work with miniatures and build dollhouses. He also has a habit of answering the phone when he passes a phone booth and hears it ringing. That doesn't happen much anymore because there are so few phone booths.

Oh, and he smokes a pipe.

Here are the backs of the first two cards in the same order. The first one was sent to Viola Vincent in Sidney, New York in 1914. The second one as sent to Miss Cassie Doran in Daleville, Pennsylvania in 1908.

Christmas Rhymes

These rhymes are much better than the one I posted earlier with a Christmas poem for Jews. That needed a little work. I know that some of you get tired of Christmas cards. On the other hand, people like me who have so many, see this as the only opportunity to post a lot of them. I wish I had some Hanukkah postcards. I would post them if I had any, but I never see them anywhere.

In any case, here's Santa with some Christmas rhymes. Feel free to download these images if you have a use for them.

Here's the back of the first card, sent to Miss Edna Witherstine in Herkimer, New York in 1910.

The back of the other cards are blank.

Fröhliche Weihnachten

This is one of the many cards I have that were sent to Trina von Oesen in Germany. I have hesitated to post them, because I struggle with the old Sütterlin handwriting.

For whatever reason, this handwriting was taught in German schools between 1915 and 1941. Thank God it wasn't longer. There are numerous problems in deciphering this handwriting, but the main ones are that so many letters look alike and that the upper case and lower case of the same letter often look very different. If I want to read these postcards, I am going to have to learn to decipher the handwriting.
Here is my name (Christine) written in Sütterlin (and that's if it's written neatly):

 It kind of makes sense if you already know what it's supposed to be, even though the letter E looks very much like the letter N.  The letter C is one of the oddest, in my opinion. Here is lowercase C and capital C:

And then there are several different versions of the letter s

Anyway, I'm determined to learn it, because otherwise I will be unable to read the backs of these cards--and there are lots of them.

This one, luckily, is fairly simple.

The front of the cards says Merry Christmas. The message on the back continues with the message:

wishes you with all his (her) heart,

Your F.      Auf Wiedersehen