JC Hall: Founder of Hallmark Cards

The story of Hallmark greeting cards is a rags to riches story. It's one of determination, creativity, and vision. Those qualities were embodied in the founder of Hallmark, J.C. Hall.

Joyce Clyde Hall or JC, as he preferred to be called, was born on August 29, 1891, in a small Nebraska town. He was the youngest son. JC showed his entrepreneurial spirit early on. When he was 16, he joined his older brothers, Rollie and William and opened a postcard company. Two years later in 1910, Hall dropped out of school. He took two shoeboxes of postcards and moved to Kansas City, Missouri. He began by selling his postcards to different stores. Rollie joined him, and in 1913, they were running their own store in downtown Kansas City. They sold postcards, gifts, books, and stationary.

In 1915, a fire destroyed their store. Instead of packing up and going home, the brothers bought an engraving firm, and started making original cards. William joined them in 1921. The company did well during the Great Depression, without having to fire any workers.

Hall was an innovator. He advertised his company when that wasn't a common thing. The Hallmark Hall of Fame movie series is one of his best forms of advertising. Periodically throughout the year movies are shown on television, sponsored by Hallmark. They've won numerous Emmy awards. Hall was told first that the company shouldn't sponsor a TV show at all, and then that it should go for the mass audience, instead of showing the types of movies it did show (it began by showing classics) but it has paid off. The Hallmark Hall of Fame series has been running for more than 50 years.


Another innovation was something we're used to now. Gift wrapping began with Hallmark. It happened on a day in 1917, when the usual gift dressing of tissue paper ran out. Rollie Hall used sheets of fancy envelop linings to wrap the purchases.

The first Presidential greeting cards were produced by Hallmark and sent out by President and Mrs. Eisenhower in 1953.