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Show First Christmas Seals Originated in Denmark To Fight Tuberculosis That harbinger of the holiday sea-son, sea-son, the cheerful Christmas Seal, has recently made its appearance as the National Tuberculosis association asso-ciation opened Its annual drive for funds to continue work in the prevention pre-vention and cure of this dread disease. dis-ease. The idea of the sale of seals to aid the fight against ireTTiJriTI tuberculosis origl-nated origl-nated in Denmark fMiSp in 1903. The follow-0tr4ibii follow-0tr4ibii 'n8 year 106 flrst I&h eals were ,old- ie v43rw idea gained almost mIKH; immediate popular-ufjjriiHjjj'1 popular-ufjjriiHjjj'1 Ity and soon spread '- to neighboring countries. coun-tries. Christmas seals appeared in the United States in 1907 when Miss Em- cwwwwi ily P. Bissel of the ? ISSLK Wilmington, Del., r Red Cross chapter j figM designed a seal that S yj was sold locally. HAPPYjfovttAH C The campaign was frwvwwi so successful that the next year the National Red Cross adopted the idea and conducted conduct-ed a nation-wide campaign. From then until 1919 the Red Cross continued con-tinued the annual Christmas Seal distribution. In their last year the returns had risen to nearly $4,000,000. Beginning with 1920 the National Tuberculosis asso-5pQ2J-7 ciation began distri-m distri-m t'lSF t button of the seals. C "43ft 1 The designs of these fl iStT s stamps have been tVK ) tne work of promi- Vmwi? have Interpreted the Christmas spirit each in his own way. In addition to the United States approximately 40 other countries have adopted the Christmas seal for raising anti-tuberculosis funds. |