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Vintage Vinegar Valentines
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Pretty much as soon as Valentines expressing sweet sentiments of love, friendship, and romance could be printed and delivered via post in the early 19th century, the anti-Valentine, or Vinegar Valentine, was born.
In the United States and the...
Pretty much as soon as Valentines expressing sweet sentiments of love, friendship, and romance could be printed and delivered via post in the early 19th century, the anti-Valentine, or Vinegar Valentine, was born.
In the United States and the United Kingdom, around February 14, the besotted, whose most amorous feelings were usually suppressed by buttoned-up Victorian society, would send anonymous poems and gifts expressing their passion to their secret crush. (For popular girls, figuring out which suitor sent each Valentine was a delightful game.) But so-called Vinegar Valentines also let the aggrieved anonymously vent their true feelings, usually with comic drawings and poems. That guessing game? Maybe not as fun.
Around the 1830s-'40s, Valentines were folded sheets of paper, sometimes sealed with wax stamps for delivery. The recipient had to pay for each letter they accepted and opened. And when one was surprised to unfold an insulting verse, the fact you had to pay to read it only made you feel worse. These folded-paper Vinegar Valentines, popular between the 1840s and 1880s, were cheap and widely mass-produced, but they're rare collectibles today, because their embarrassed recipients tended to throw them in the trash.
What offenses might warrant a Vinegar Valentine? Well, a sender might scold the town drunk, the local lecher, the neighborhood gossip, a know-it-all, a vain dandy, a pompous twit, an arrogant saleswoman, or a terrible singer. ("When a pig's getting slaughtered, the noise it makes / Is sweeter by far than your trills and your shakes.") At times, the Vinegar Valentines punched up, knocking corrupt businessmen, brutal cops, and mean bosses. Some were sent simply to turn down romantic overtures. Some were playfully teasing; others were overtly hostile or just plain cruel, mocking the recipient as ugly, fat, poor, or hopelessly single (addressed to Old Maid, Spinster, or Bachelor). The most horrifying Vinegar Valentines recommended suicide.
The American Civil War in the 1860s inspired many war-specific Vinegar Valentines, like this note to a quartermaster: "You fat old cuss, give us our grub, / You have our cash to feed us, / You're paid to keep us in good trim, / And not to sponge and bleed us." Confederacy president Jefferson Davis is also a target: "You are the two-faced villain, though not very bold / Who would barter your country for might or gold."
Vinegar Valentines—which are distinct from the cheap, pulpy street literature known as Penny Dreadfuls—were also tools used to reinforce social norms; they were sent to couples from their neighbors to uphold the gender binary. Fathers who tended to their babies too much were mocked for being womanly, while women who were assertive were scorned for behaving too much like men. For example, a "Henpecked Husband" Vinegar Valentine asserts, "The way you brag in the saloons / You'd think you were boss in the house, / But at home you wash the dishes / And keep as quiet as a mouse."
Valentine's Day went out of fashion in the 1880s, as Americans and Brits complained the sacred love holiday had been ruined by crass commercialism. But swoony Valentines and Vinegar Valentines re-emerged in 1896, as the fad for postcards took off. Since mail was then delivered multiple times a day in urban areas and postcards were inexpensive, people back then could send out sassy smack-downs almost as fast as modern-day wits churn out sick Twitter burns.
A pretentious poet might receive a card that read, "Behold this pale little poet, / With a finger at forehead to show it; / But the way he gets scads / Is by writing soap ads, / But he wants nobody to know it!" A bad driver might be heckled with the verse, "He rushes his car with a will, / All things in his path he does kill; / Dogs, cats and babies, / Old men and ladies, / While he seldom suffers a spill." A "lazy man" could get this note, "Get up and work, put out your pipe, / and throw away that can; / We haven't seen you move for years, / You good-for-nothing man." Instead of a bad Yelp review, the baker might receive a card that told him, "Your bread is light as lead, we know; / The neighbors all have told us so. / You're filling every graveyard near / With heavy pastry made so queer."
During the Golden Age of Postcards (1896-1917), a popular target for Vinegar Valentine postcards were the Suffragettes in England and the Suffragists in the United States fighting for women's right to vote. These women were upending gender norms, and countless postcards were produced reprimanding them for it.
The Vinegar Valentine tradition carried on past women receiving the right to vote, past World War I, even when postcards were usurped by telephones and ham radios as the quickest ways to communicate. Postcard companies were still making these taunting Valentines, from light-hearted to nasty, well into the 1940s. And, as always, the rhymes on these vintage Vinegars are priceless. On a predatory man: "You think that you are Heaven's gift to every gal you see / But you're really just a two-bit chump, as corny as can be!" On a "bookworm": "You're duller than that junk you read / Those books of yours all stink; / Your head is filled with worthless tripe, / And your veins with printer's ink!"
Continue readingPretty much as soon as Valentines expressing sweet sentiments of love, friendship, and romance could be printed and delivered via post in the early 19th century, the anti-Valentine, or Vinegar Valentine, was born.
In the United States and the United Kingdom, around February 14, the besotted, whose most amorous feelings were usually suppressed by buttoned-up Victorian society, would send anonymous poems and gifts expressing their passion to their secret crush. (For popular girls, figuring out which suitor sent each Valentine was a delightful game.) But so-called Vinegar Valentines also let the aggrieved anonymously vent their true feelings, usually with comic drawings and poems. That guessing game? Maybe not as fun.
Around the 1830s-'40s, Valentines were folded sheets of paper, sometimes sealed with wax stamps for delivery. The recipient had to pay for each letter they accepted and opened. And when one was surprised to unfold an insulting verse, the fact you had to pay to read it only made you feel worse. These folded-paper Vinegar Valentines, popular between the 1840s and 1880s, were cheap and widely mass-produced, but they're rare collectibles today, because their embarrassed recipients tended to throw them in the trash.
What offenses might warrant a Vinegar Valentine? Well, a sender might scold the town drunk, the local lecher, the neighborhood gossip, a know-it-all, a vain dandy, a pompous twit, an arrogant saleswoman, or a terrible singer. ("When a pig's getting slaughtered, the noise it makes / Is sweeter by far than your trills and your shakes.") At times, the Vinegar Valentines punched up, knocking corrupt businessmen, brutal cops, and mean bosses. Some were sent simply to turn down romantic overtures. Some were playfully teasing; others were overtly hostile or just plain cruel, mocking the recipient as ugly, fat, poor, or hopelessly single (addressed to Old Maid, Spinster, or Bachelor). The most horrifying Vinegar Valentines recommended...
Pretty much as soon as Valentines expressing sweet sentiments of love, friendship, and romance could be printed and delivered via post in the early 19th century, the anti-Valentine, or Vinegar Valentine, was born.
In the United States and the United Kingdom, around February 14, the besotted, whose most amorous feelings were usually suppressed by buttoned-up Victorian society, would send anonymous poems and gifts expressing their passion to their secret crush. (For popular girls, figuring out which suitor sent each Valentine was a delightful game.) But so-called Vinegar Valentines also let the aggrieved anonymously vent their true feelings, usually with comic drawings and poems. That guessing game? Maybe not as fun.
Around the 1830s-'40s, Valentines were folded sheets of paper, sometimes sealed with wax stamps for delivery. The recipient had to pay for each letter they accepted and opened. And when one was surprised to unfold an insulting verse, the fact you had to pay to read it only made you feel worse. These folded-paper Vinegar Valentines, popular between the 1840s and 1880s, were cheap and widely mass-produced, but they're rare collectibles today, because their embarrassed recipients tended to throw them in the trash.
What offenses might warrant a Vinegar Valentine? Well, a sender might scold the town drunk, the local lecher, the neighborhood gossip, a know-it-all, a vain dandy, a pompous twit, an arrogant saleswoman, or a terrible singer. ("When a pig's getting slaughtered, the noise it makes / Is sweeter by far than your trills and your shakes.") At times, the Vinegar Valentines punched up, knocking corrupt businessmen, brutal cops, and mean bosses. Some were sent simply to turn down romantic overtures. Some were playfully teasing; others were overtly hostile or just plain cruel, mocking the recipient as ugly, fat, poor, or hopelessly single (addressed to Old Maid, Spinster, or Bachelor). The most horrifying Vinegar Valentines recommended suicide.
The American Civil War in the 1860s inspired many war-specific Vinegar Valentines, like this note to a quartermaster: "You fat old cuss, give us our grub, / You have our cash to feed us, / You're paid to keep us in good trim, / And not to sponge and bleed us." Confederacy president Jefferson Davis is also a target: "You are the two-faced villain, though not very bold / Who would barter your country for might or gold."
Vinegar Valentines—which are distinct from the cheap, pulpy street literature known as Penny Dreadfuls—were also tools used to reinforce social norms; they were sent to couples from their neighbors to uphold the gender binary. Fathers who tended to their babies too much were mocked for being womanly, while women who were assertive were scorned for behaving too much like men. For example, a "Henpecked Husband" Vinegar Valentine asserts, "The way you brag in the saloons / You'd think you were boss in the house, / But at home you wash the dishes / And keep as quiet as a mouse."
Valentine's Day went out of fashion in the 1880s, as Americans and Brits complained the sacred love holiday had been ruined by crass commercialism. But swoony Valentines and Vinegar Valentines re-emerged in 1896, as the fad for postcards took off. Since mail was then delivered multiple times a day in urban areas and postcards were inexpensive, people back then could send out sassy smack-downs almost as fast as modern-day wits churn out sick Twitter burns.
A pretentious poet might receive a card that read, "Behold this pale little poet, / With a finger at forehead to show it; / But the way he gets scads / Is by writing soap ads, / But he wants nobody to know it!" A bad driver might be heckled with the verse, "He rushes his car with a will, / All things in his path he does kill; / Dogs, cats and babies, / Old men and ladies, / While he seldom suffers a spill." A "lazy man" could get this note, "Get up and work, put out your pipe, / and throw away that can; / We haven't seen you move for years, / You good-for-nothing man." Instead of a bad Yelp review, the baker might receive a card that told him, "Your bread is light as lead, we know; / The neighbors all have told us so. / You're filling every graveyard near / With heavy pastry made so queer."
During the Golden Age of Postcards (1896-1917), a popular target for Vinegar Valentine postcards were the Suffragettes in England and the Suffragists in the United States fighting for women's right to vote. These women were upending gender norms, and countless postcards were produced reprimanding them for it.
The Vinegar Valentine tradition carried on past women receiving the right to vote, past World War I, even when postcards were usurped by telephones and ham radios as the quickest ways to communicate. Postcard companies were still making these taunting Valentines, from light-hearted to nasty, well into the 1940s. And, as always, the rhymes on these vintage Vinegars are priceless. On a predatory man: "You think that you are Heaven's gift to every gal you see / But you're really just a two-bit chump, as corny as can be!" On a "bookworm": "You're duller than that junk you read / Those books of yours all stink; / Your head is filled with worthless tripe, / And your veins with printer's ink!"
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