Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1917-02-08

And I've been told your pretty face
Is we'll known In each public place.
and If we wed you'll soon adorn
My brow with antlers from Cape Horn.
Thus prudence makes me to decline
Your company, my Valentine.
To this the reply was tart, not to say shrewisL.
Indeed, our own more polite age would scarcely
care to hear so crude a letter from q feinlnlnc
versifer. These valentine books. from which most
of the lovelorn SWANS Of the early eighteenth
century cuIleh the lines that they wrote to their
loves, were published in collections bearing such
titles as "Curid's Directory" "Carvalho's Polite
Valentine Writer" and ''The Frolicsome Valentine
Writer" the last a collection containing many
examples Of early eighteenth-century humor OF q
sort which almost reconciles one to the merry
professional ieSts of ones own era.
The Manufactured Valentine.
It was n girl who started the business OF manu-.
featuring valentines for sale in the United States
"a most rntcrprisins girl named Esther Rowland.
who had Just been graduated from Mount Holyoke
seminary and resided with her father In Worces-
ter. Mass. In 1910 she received from England a
manufactured valentine. the first she had ever
seen. II interested her so much that she DECIDED
to see whether she could make some of these val
entines and find n sale for them. With lace paper,
cut.Out pictures and printed verses she manu-
featured several samples and gave them to her
brother to take out OH the road to show custom
ers when he went on his trip for their fathers
stationery business. To her nmnzemcnt. her broth
cr returned with orders for $1,000 worth OF val
entines. Miss Rowland. Of course. wns quite I'M
nble to carry out the orders herself, but she called
her young woman friends to her assistance. and
they Immediately started what later developed into
a very large and prosperous valentine manufactur-
ing plant. In a few years they were sending out
100000 worth Of valentines ench season.
The comic valentine. which was painfully ugly
and coarse. and which nOurishcd very broadly Mt
one time, has now almost entirely passed away. Mt
least in It's cruder forms, II used to be the grent-
est happiness Of the schoolhoy's life TO purchase
a very large assortment Of these wretchcd comics
and leave them on the front doorstep Of his school.
teacher, male or female. Then when he had left a
few comics on the steps Of the village constable
and raid his respects in similar fashion to the
Sunday school superintendent he felt that st. Val
entlnc's eve Ind been well spent. The Joy OF st
Valentines day has diminished greatly since the
practice If throwing valentines on the doorstep
ringing the hell and running. gave place TO the less
exciting method Of mall delivery. But In spite Of
rp-to.date interference with the valentine spirit. ~
Valentines dry always viii hold it, own. The
most famous valentine verse ever written n still
bcing attached to homemade valentines In pnin
fully neat children's handwriting In various
happy districts where boys and girls have real fut
without spending much money for valentines o.
anything else. Roses are NJ red M ever and vlo
lets are ,sttll true blue In the Joyous lind Of bO!
and girl love affairs where reigns the good 81. Val
cntlne.