Have you ever wondered what happens to the Christmas cards you send out year after year? Many are hung on friends’ and families’ refrigerators, while some make their way to historic archives. The Kelley House Museum archive is home to numerous Christmas postcards, written in a variety of languages and spanning decades, from the late 1800s to the 1930s.
Over 10 archived Christmas postcards are addressed to Neiti (Miss) Hilja Ritaniemi, who lived in Elk, Albion, and Comptche at various times. These postcards represent Hilja’s only presence in the Kelley House archive. It is unclear who she is outside of her holiday correspondence.
A single woman by the same name appears as an arriving passenger at New York’s Ellis Island on August 25, 1909. This Hilja was 21 years old and born in Hameenisyrd, Finland. She named San Francisco, California as her destination and reported having a friend in the U.S., Sivaro Salo. The Mendocino coast did have a significant population of Finns in the early 20th century, and there was a Salo family that lived on the coast. This may be the same woman! Not all of Hilja’s cards have written messages, but those that do are in Finnish. One undated card roughly reads “A happy and joyful holiday wished for by me, Maria L,” likely from a family member still living in Finland.
The postcards include the typical holiday wishes you would find inside full-sized cards today. Miss Amy Hermanson was the recipient of several cards. One boasting an angel playing the violin reads “My Dear ‘Cousin’: A Merry Xmas + A Happy New Year.” Amy received another from Hilda Slotte on September 11, 1908, which doesn’t include a message other than “Bot at Mrs. Rowe’s Candy Store,” written in pencil.
Some Christmas cards were just photographs. By the turn of the century, photography became accessible to the wider population, and it was common to give photos of yourself to others. In an extreme version of this, Eugene Brown gifted his friend Alexander MacCallum a red leather photo album with 33 photos in various sizes. The inscription on the inside cover reads: “Christmas, 1873.”
Inside the back cover is a music box. The album includes studio portraits of Eugene, Alexander, many unidentified people, and, oddly, Empress Elisabeth of Austria. She was the ruling Austrian monarch at the time, but otherwise it’s unclear why her portrait was included.
Kelley House Museum curator Averee McNear writes a weekly column on Mendocino County history for Mendocino Voice. To learn more, visit kelleyhousemuseum.org.