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| The post office in Bethlehem, Georgia. Photo by me, December 2024. |
Growing up in the 1980s and watching Atlanta television news there were some stories that would be recycled every year during the holiday season between Thanksgiving and New Year. One was the lighting of the Rich's Great Tree in Downtown, there would the annual Hosea Feed The Hungry and Homeless on Thanksgiving, the Christmas parade, the Peach Drop at Underground and at least one of the television stations would assign a field reporter to drive northeast of town to far-flung Bethlehem, Georgia in Barrow County to do a story on Christmas cards.
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| Bethlehem, Georgia in 1978 when I was five years old. It looked more like a traditional town then than it does today. The tiny post office then is in the second row on the right. Images courtesy WSB-TV archives at the University of Georgia. |
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| Bethlehem, Georgia in December 2023 and December 2024. There is very little remaining of what stood in the late 70s. It looks less like a town today and more like a wide spot in the road. Photos by me. |
I did not know where Bethlehem, Georgia was located when I was a child in Paulding County. I had never been there until a few years ago when I moved out of Atlanta. Now I pass through every couple of weeks on my way to Monroe. Bethlehem is a small town, population seven hundred and fifteen as of the 2020 census, that is more of a community than a true town with a cluster of businesses and sidewalks. It reminds me of where I grew up in another small Georgia community in the 1970s and 80s. Except, Bethlehem has one traffic light and a post office and my hometown did not. My old community has long since been swallowed by the Atlanta sprawl of subdivisions and shopping centers and unfortunately the sprawl is now beginning to edge towards Bethlehem too. I hate to see it happen again as no place in Georgia north of the Fall Line seems to be immune from it.
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| By Bureau of Engraving and Printing. - U.S. Postal Service; National Postal Museum: 1967 Christmas Issue |
There is a special Christmas tradition that this little town just off the newly finished exit off Highway 316 is known for: the Christmas postmark from Bethlehem for Christmas cards. The tradition began in 1967 and at the time included a special issue postage stamp from the United States Postal Service which has since been discontinued. The special postmark still includes the Three Wise Men and the Star of Bethlehem and reads, 'Greetings from Bethlehem.' During the first Christmas season, the tiny post office that employed a postmaster general and one part-time employee handled 500,000 cards and letters. Over three dozen temporary employees were hired to handle the volume.
Over the decades since, I wondered if maybe the tradition had waned, but when I mailed cards this past Sunday, the slot for out of town mail was stuffed full. It was a happy sight for me to know that people were still sending cards and sending them out of Bethlehem for the postmark. In a time when the cheap spectacle reigns supreme over value and people cannot seem to be bothered with most traditions anymore like dressing appropriately for funerals and weddings it is surprising to know that this one continues.
Every year my family sent out Christmas cards and I still carry on the tradition though I never receive a single card in return. The last year I received a card in the mail was in 2003, the last Christmas my mother was alive. I refuse to let the tradition die that I see as a way to acknowledge someone and wish them well during the holidays without relying on a soon to be forgotten social media greeting. I wrote about my memories of Christmas cards last year.
Merry Christmas, season's greetings and happy holidays to you.
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