Old-Timey Christmas Cards Were Weird

Eric Lund

Nov 29, 2021 10:00 PM EST

We are here to inform you that old-time Christmas cards were horrifically, awfully weird. Just like everything else about the past, it doesn't make sense to us intelligent beings living in the present. Twitter user @RabbitThoughts created a wonderful thread detailing these weird Christmas cards, which they say came about when postage stamps grew cheap in the 1800s. From frogs and bugs dancing together, a horrifying depiction of Krampus, and people with chicken heads going sledding in the snow, these Christmas cards are absolutely crazy to people used to cute drawings of Santa, reindeers, and snowmen in the modern world.

Nowadays, the holidays are a time for family gatherings, drinking (or hating) egg nog, and considerably less murder-by-bears. Apparently before we had the now classic Santa-in-the-red-suit business, people had dancing frog, turnip-aristocrats, and flowers that spring forth babies as Christmas cards. Seriously, why are there so many frogs in these?

For other surprising old-timey stuff, there's also some cool vintage life-hacks from forever ago.

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