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Archival description
Rare Books and Special Collections Greeting Card Collection Series
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Valentine's cards

Series consists of greeting cards, prints, and ephemera celebrating St. Valentine's Day. Items date from between approximately 1790 to the late twentieth century.

Christmas cards

Series consists of Christmas cards as well as some New Year's greeting cards produced between approximately 1920 and 1989. Many cards come from universities and cultural institutions. Greeting companies like Hallmark and Carleton Cards are represented later on chronologically in the series. Many cards during the 1940s reflect various international aid efforts.

Holy cards and religious ephemera

Series consists of mostly Christian religious ephemera, including holy cards or prayer cards (small devotional images, often with passages of text from prayers), greetings cards with religious messages (often with the names of their recipients intact), postcards of churches, pamphlets with Biblical passages or intended for spiritual instruction, and some memorabilia such as pendants, necklaces, crucifixes, and church donation envelopes. Most of the religious ephemera is Catholic, with some material from other Christian denominations such as Anglican and Unitarian. Judaism, Hare Krishna, Jehovah's Witnesses, and the Church of Scientology are represented by one or two items each. Materials are largely undated, but appear to date from predominantly the 1950s through the 1980s with some earlier items. One booklet contains the official welcoming ceremony for Pope Jean-Paul II at the Cathedral Basilica. Box 2 (Flat box R-1190-18) contains chiefly prayer cards organized by country, including Great Britain, Switzerland, Israel, Spain, Portugal, Germany, and Belgium.

Series also contains a number of parish publications, such as programmes from church events and recitals as well as newsletters. A number of colour postcards depict Italian churches. Newsletters includes issues of the Le Messager de Saint-Antoine (from the Ermitage Saint-Antoine), the Paulist Fathers News, and Regard de foi. Most church publications are from institutions in the Montreal area, including Notre-Dame Church, Christ Church Cathedral, and Saint-Léon-de-Westmount, but some are from churches in Ontario, the United States (Florida), and France.

There is a great deal of Catholic published ephemera, including many numbers of the series "Est-il vrai que...?" in French written by Jean Delepierre on social values and religion, as well as guides to various sacraments such as confirmation, baptism, communion, etc.