Sandford Greeting Card Company and Family Papers

About the Project

Mary Elizabeth Kennedy Sandford founded the Sandford Card Company in Dansville, New York in 1907. The Sandford Card Company was intended to provide consumers with a means to send messages to family and friends. These messages contained well thought out verses and images on products other than the typical postcards that were available during this time period. Initially, Mary Elizabeth created four verses with images and had five thousand of each printed by the F. A. Owen Publishing Company. The four samples were sent to two hundred bookstores and drugstores. Sales were later made with distributors and agents in various cities throughout the country. In addition, the company also sold cards to fraternal organizations using their symbols or mottos in the design. Eventually, fraternal organizations became a big part of the company's customer base expanding to more than fifty groups. Join our #TCGreetings campaign, and help us transcribe materials from the Sandford family, including holiday greeting cards, personal correspondence, and family photographs,

The company grew as a mail order business. All card shipments were made directly from Dansville, New York to forty eight states and countries including Canada, Alaska, Cuba, Japan, Guam, Philippines, Hawaii, Panama, and Netherlands, West Indies, England and Scotland. Although the Sandford Card Company started as a greeting card business it eventually offered place cards, calling cards, calendars, program folders, napkins, banquet supplies, gifts and souvenirs to its product line. All printing work was contracted out to lithographic businesses in New York, Boston and Cincinnati. With the death of Mary Elizabeth Sandford and her husband Frank Sherman Sandford the company continued to be operated under the guidance of their daughter Ruth Louise Sandford. In 1948, Ruth Sandford hired John G. Holden as business manager. In 1965, the company moved from Dansville to Baldwinsville, New York under the management of the third generation of the founding family. It continued to operate as a family business until 19?? when it was sold to John G. Holden. The company was later purchased by Rodney Pease the grandson of Mary Elizabeth Sandford's sister Lillian Frances Pease. Pease eventually changed the name of the company and took it in a different direction.

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