Reply #8: This might be the card....

[seriousstan]

http://www.hymnsandcarolsofchristmas.com/Cards/first_christmas_card.htm

Credit for designing the Christmas card is given to John Callcott Horsley (1817-1903), a Royal Academician and well-known painter who designed the first Christmas card in December 1843 at the request of Sir Henry Cole (1808-1882), founding director of the South Kensington Museum (renamed the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1899) and closely associated with the Great Exhibition of 1851. The first Christmas card appeared in the same year that Charles Dickens penned The Christmas Carol

The first edition of cards was lithographed and hand colored and shows a family party and with the legend "A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to You." They were printed on stiff cardboard, 5 1/8 by 3 1/4 inches, by Jobbins of Warwick Court, Holborn, London. Each was then hand-colored in dark sepia by a professional "colourer" named Mason. It also states that is was "Published at Summerly's Home Treasury Office, 12 Old Bond Street, London," by his friend and associate Joseph Cundall; the publishing firm was owned by Cole. Those he didn't use were sold from Summerly's for one shilling each. According to Cundall, "many copies were sold, but possibly not more than 1,000." 2 Only a dozen of the originals are known to exist today. One of these went to auction on Saturday, November 24, 2001; it sold for a record £22,500 (US$ 32,337 as of January 3, 2002). It was sent by Sir Henry to his "Granny and Auntie Char" and was signed by Sir Henry, which makes it exceptionally rare. Ordinarily, one of these cards is expected to go from between £3,000 and £6,000.

Cole's card is about the size of an ordinary postcard, 3 1/4 x 5 1/8. The card showed a family enjoying a Christmas feast as they all toast their absent friend (the addressee) during the festive season with glasses of red wine. It was set within a woody, rustic border hung with ivy, grapes and vine leaves (holly did not appear on Christmas cards until 1848 by William Maw Egley, Jr.). The oblong side pieces depict the charitable acts of "clothing the naked" and "feeding the hungry".4 However, the middle panel caused such a stir with the public that the cards were withdrawn from sale.5 Family, good works, and good eating and drinking, three elements of a classical Victorian Christmas made an appearance on the first Christmas card.