Vintage Thanksgiving Turkey Card, Victorian Era Chromolithograph

Fever-dream chimera energy radiates from this postcard—someone in the early 1900s looked at a turkey and thought, 'yes, but what if it had a human child's face where the head should be' — and thus this image was born, a woman's profile seamlessly fused onto a full turkey body rendered in iridescent green and gold plumage. The bird-person hybrid strides forward with purpose, its very human nose and chin jutting out above a very un-human wattle, the whole ensemble glowing with the kind of color saturation that suggests the artist was either a visionary or extremely unwell. And yet, perched on a decorative scroll to the right, the message 'Put all care away on Thanksgiving Day' sits in cheerful cursive — as if the existence of a human-faced turkey strutting toward you isn't itself the source of all care.