Valentine’s Day from the historical society!

luykasgroundhog:

I was hoping to find a special way to wish all of you a very happy Valentine’s Day, so I asked our curator (the person who takes care of the objects the museum collects, more on her later) about how people in Columbia County celebrated Valentine’s Day in the past.  She was nice enough to show me these paper Valentines that people would have given to a friend or a sweetheart.  Some of them are a little fancier, but they are not really that different from what we hand out today! 

These Valentines were printed using a process called lithography, which uses a special stone and greasy ink to make a print.  A lithography stone can be printed many times, which made it perfect for things like greeting cards, that were printed over and over and over.  By the late 1800’s, printers had figured out how to make inexpensive, full-color prints using lithography.  That meant that Valentine cards like these ones were affordable for people to buy and give to their friends.

Some of the cards have little poems on the inside.  The inside of one of these ones reads:

“I just ran over your way

With this valentine to-day

So take this little hint from me,

That I your valentine would be”

Who, or what, do you love this Valentine’s Day?  I don’t have a Valentine, but I do love history!