• Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to secondary sidebar

New York Almanack

History, Natural History & the Arts

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • Adirondacks & NNY
  • Capital-Saratoga
  • Mohawk Valley
  • Hudson Valley & Catskills
  • NYC & Long Island
  • Western NY
  • History
  • Nature & Environment
  • Arts & Culture
  • Outdoor Recreation
  • Food & Farms
  • Subscribe
  • Support
  • Submit
  • About
  • New Books
  • Events
  • Podcasts

America’s First Christmas Card & An Early Albany Department Store

December 24, 2022 by Editorial Staff 1 Comment

America's First Christmas Card, Designed and printed by Richard H. Pease for his "Pease's Great Variety Store in the Temple of Fancy" c.1851. Image courtesy of Manchester Metropolitan University Special Collections.Before F. W. Woolworths’, Whitney’s, or even Myer’s department store, there was Pease’s Great Variety Store, located in the Temple of Fancy at 516 and 518 Broadway in Albany, NY.

As with other fancy goods stores, Pease’s catered to the middle and upper middle class selling highly decorated goods like ceramics, prints, furniture and other decorative household items that progressively thinking people might have wanted to purchase.The 1844 Wilson’s Albany City Guide provides a flattering description of Pease’s:

“For richness and extensive variety of novelties, combining the beautiful, the useful and the ornamental, this establishment excels any in town. Mr. P. has many fancy articles which are surpassingly rich; exceeding anything in elegance that we have ever thought, dreamed or read of.”

Pease Temple of Fancy Early Albany Department Store (Albany Institute)Pease’s advertisement in the Albany Evening Journal on December 17, 1841, is claimed as the first time Santa Claus was used to advertise a store. They also produced the hand-colored lithographs of fruit for Ebenezer Emmons’ Agriculture of New York published between 1846 and 1854.

In 2011, an Albany Institute of History & Art exhibit featured Richard H. Pease’s upscale “Five and Dime” where Albany families could purchase fancy goods, toys, household items, children’s books, and games from the 1830s to 1855.

The exhibit drew on the collections of the Albany Institute, and included a reproduction of Pease’s 1850-51 Christmas card, considered to be the first printed in America, on loan from the Manchester University Museum in England, where the only surviving copy resides.

The Albany Institute produced a 20-page booklet, Pease’s Great Variety Store and the Story of America’s first Christmas Card, for sale in the Museum Shop.

Illustrations: Above, courtesy Albany Institute of History & Art; below, America’s First Christmas Card, Designed and printed by Richard H. Pease for his “Pease’s Great Variety Store in the Temple of Fancy” c.1851. Image courtesy of Manchester Metropolitan University Special Collections.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Filed Under: Arts, Capital-Saratoga, History, New Exhibits Tagged With: Albany, Albany County, Albany Institute For History and Art, Art History, Christmas, Cultural History, Holidays, Instagram, Pop Culture History

About Editorial Staff

Stories written under the Editorial Staff byline are drawn from press releases and other notices. Submit your news to New York Almanack here.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Julie O’Connor says

    December 11, 2020 at 2:26 PM

    Interesting that there is an African American servant depicted in central card scene, when in this time period most female domestic servants were Irish. Also, it appears there may be several other AA figures in scene in upper left.

    Also on top there is a Santa Claus that looks very different from Santa in Pease ad in early 1840s. Much closer to Nast Santa about 20 years later.

    Pease’s first Great Variety Store was located at 50 Broadway before it moved to upper Broadway in middle 1840s.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Help Support The Almanack

Subscribe to New York Almanack

Subscribe! Follow the New York Almanack each day via E-mail, RSS, Twitter or Facebook updates.

Recent Comments

  • Karla L Phelps on Long Island’s Culper Spy Ring History
  • James S. Kaplzn on Iroquois and the Invention of the Empire State
  • James S. Kaplan on New York State Canals Bicentennial: Some History & Plans For Celebrations
  • M Raff on Deep Time: Lake Ontario’s Lucky Stones & Fossils
  • N. Couture on Iroquois and the Invention of the Empire State
  • Bob on Are Baby Boomers The Worst Generation?
  • Anonymous on Gymnastics History: The Legacy of Friedrich Ludwig Jahn’s Turnerism
  • Editorial Staff on Women at Seneca Knitting Mill in Seneca Falls
  • B cottingham-kleckner on Women at Seneca Knitting Mill in Seneca Falls
  • Landscaping By G. Pellegrino on Work Begins On Bayard Cutting Arboretum Visitors Center

Recent New York Books

“The Amazing Iroquois” and the Invention of the Empire State
american inheritance
Norman Rockwell's Models
The 1947 Utica Blue Sox Book Cover
vanishing point
From the Battlefield to the Stage
field of corpses
Madison's Militia
in the adirondacks

Secondary Sidebar

Mohawk Valley Trading Company Honey, Honey Comb, Buckwheat Honey, Beeswax Candles, Maple Syrup, Maple Sugar
preservation league