Archive: Around Town

Wednesday was Valentine's Day.  Love was in the air, and also at the Lansing Community library where the Lansing Historical Association is displaying an exhibit of Lansing Valentines and dance party invitations.  The exhibit features store-bought and home made cards from as far back as 1908.

"Fannie Welsh and Kathy LaLonde have been working on an antique Valentine exhibit," says Lansing Historian Louise Bement.  "Some of these postcards are from 1908.  Some of them are from the 1930s."

A photo card from 1964 features Joseph Hradisky Jr. surrounded by Loretta Welsh and Jean Bohmer holding over-sized hearts.  They posed for the picture in Mrs. Minnie LaVigne's Kindergarten class at Lansing Elementary School.  Some are commercially made post cards, including the one from 1908.

"It was colorized," Bement says. "They were sent to Germany to get colored."

Also featured are dance party invitations from the Smith Hotel in North Lansing, Haye's Hall in Ludlowville, and , and the Central Exchange Hotel in South Lansing.  The latter is the only one left standing, now called the  Rogue's Harbor Inn.  The invitations were specific.  the organizers of the dance at the Central Exchange wanted to be clear that "No gentlemen will be admitted without a lady.  Supper and horses extra."

"You had to have your horses in a barn," Bement explains. "You had to pay extra for that."


A number of cards that work like intricate pop-up books are also on display, plus a triptych calendar card from 1898 with three scenes.

"Beth Bacorn gave us that and she gave us quite a few of them," Bement says. "They're just gorgeous."

The Valentine's Day exhibit is in the gallery at the Lansing Community Library through the end of February.

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