Hoping for a Bethlehem Postmark

Realizing tomorrow is December 1st I was prompted to pick up a couple of extra boxes of Christmas cards today, and I hope to get them prepared to mail over the weekend.

That’s my goal every year, but I haven’t met it in years. In fact, I usually have to give up my desire to send cards because I simply run out of time.

This year….I am determined.

When I was a little girl I loved reading through Mom and Dad’s cards, but the envelopes intrigued me just as much. I loved the stamps and the postmarks……especially the ones that had come from Christmas sounding places like Bethlehem, Georgia. Back in the 70’s we always had at least two or three.

Bethlehem is a small, small hamlet with less than one thousand people….probably somewhere around 700. It was one of the towns the state deleted from official maps a few months back because of its size and their belief they were decluttering the maps. The town can be found on Georgia 11 between Lawrenceville and Athens in Barrow County.

Generally life in Bethlehem is pretty slow going until December when hundreds of people from the surrounding area descend on the Bethlehem, Georgia post office to mail their Christmas cards. People that know people living in Bethlehem mail their cards and stamp money to them in order to have the Bethlehem postmark. It’s a sort of tradition, I guess.

I wonder if I’ll get a postmark this year from Georgia's version of the city of David?

Well, one thing is for certain I won’t get many cards if I don’t send some, so off I go to get them done.

Bethlehem's official webpage
Other places with Christmas sounding names
The picture of the post office is from the official webpage.