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Holiday Cards Fund Good Cause

Posted on December 12, 2015December 13, 2015 By Ann Thompson

The History of Christmas and Chanukah Cards, Our Geezers and NAVH in San Francisco.
It all began with a little boy who was born with a pigment defi­ciency called Albinism. His mother, Lorraine Marchi, discov­ered that although partial vision was far from rare, chil­dren and adults had a strong tendency to hide it and there were no large print books avail­able for them to read. She formed a committee to print large print books for chil­dren and later for adults. Lorraine learned the printing game and began to print on an offset press at a local San Fran­cisco hospital. Then she persuaded an orga­ni­za­tion to buy her a two color press which she installed in the base­ment of her home in Laurel Heights. Lorraine attracted many volun­teers to expand the book printing oper­a­tion and then went on to form National Aid to Visu­ally Hand­i­capped or NAVH — later known as the National Asso­ci­a­tion for Visu­ally Handicapped.
Harriet Hunter was one of the early volun­teers and she knew that funds for the strug­gling orga­ni­za­tion were needed to continue printing the books and offering guides and visual aids to millions of ​“low-vision” people. So, ener­getic Lorraine solicited OUR Harriet, Alice Harth and Jane Kris­tiansen to find artists who would contribute their talent in designing Christmas and Chanukah cards.

Jane Kristiansen
Jane Kristiansen 
Alice Harth
Alice Harth 
Harriet Hunter
Harriet Hunter 

A few of our Geezer contrib­u­tors were: Fred Meinke, Dick Moore, Annie Thompson, Jane Oka, Bill Hyde, Lowell Herrero, Char­lotte Stevenson, Mike Dattel, Alice Harth, Harriet Hunter and Jane Kris­tiansen. Many of these artists and volun­teers would work on week­ends to help Lorraine print and fold the cards in the Summer and Fall to be ready for the holiday sales. There were full color cata­logs sent out prior to that time which were also printed in the base­ment. Several years later the cards were printed profes­sion­ally and for many years were collected by supporters of NAVH.

Click on the image for a larger view

Harriet, Lorraine and Jane
Harriet, Lorraine and Jane 

Click on the image for a larger view

NAVH-BULLETIN
The money brought from sales of cards helped the orga­ni­za­tion stay afloat. Lorraine passed away in 2011 but her vision to help ​“Hard of Seeing” people continues here in San Fran­cisco and New York.

1963

Dick Moore 1963
Dick Moore 1963 
Alice Harth 1963
Alice Harth 1963 
Alice Harth 1963
Alice Harth 1963 
Jane Oka 1963
Jane Oka 1963 
Dick Moore 1963
Dick Moore 1963 

1964

Alice Harth 1964
Alice Harth 1964 
Dick Moore 1964
Dick Moore 1964 
Harriet Hunter 1964
Harriet Hunter 1964 
Jane Kristansen 1964
Jane Kris­tansen 1964 
Jane Oka 1964
Jane Oka 1964 

1965

Alice Harth 1965
Alice Harth 1965 
Dick Moore 1965
Dick Moore 1965 
Fred Meinke 1965
Fred Meinke 1965 
Harriet Hunter 1965
Harriet Hunter 1965 
Jane Kristansen 1965
Jane Kris­tansen 1965 
Jane Oka 1965
Jane Oka 1965 
Yeffe Kimball 1965
Yeffe Kimball 1965 

1966

Lowell Herrero 1966
Lowell Herrero 1966 
Irving Amen 1966
Irving Amen 1966 
Bill Hyde 1966
Bill Hyde 1966 
Charlotte Stevenson 1966
Char­lotte Stevenson 1966 
Jane Oka 1966
Jane Oka 1966 
Fred Meinke 1966
Fred Meinke 1966 
Sven Linderman 1966
Sven Linderman 1966 
Irving Amen 1966
Irving Amen 1966 
Alice Harth 1966
Alice Harth 1966 

1967

Ann Thompson 1967
Ann Thompson 1967 

This NAVH history and collec­tion of cards is shared by Jane Kristiansen.

Note: Only a few cards were avail­able for 1963. The collec­tions for years 1964 to 1966 are mostly complete. The only example for 1967, is my card which luckily we sold at great quan­tity to Thomas C. Lynch, the 25th Attorney General of Cali­fornia, appointed Attorney General by Governor Pat Brown in August of 1964.

Next December, I plan to show addi­tional collec­tions of NAVH cards.

Ann Thompson

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