Document text
Click Here 42 °F Forecast | Road Cams Saturday, January 31, 2004 Today's News | Classifieds | Autos | Homes | Jobs | Tempo | Health | Community | Home Delivery SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion - Politics AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map EXTRA Newspaper in Education Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People CLASSIFIEDS Find a Car Find a Home Find a Job Find a Rental Place an ad eSouthernOregon Automotive Communities Entertainment Publications Recreation Calendar CUSTOMER SERVICE Frequent Questions Advertising Information Home Delivery Employment Contact Us Media Kit Network Affiliate Email Story to a Friend December 19, 2003 Fitz and Ann Brewer of Medford, both 72, have sent photo Christmas cards for nearly 50 years. Mail Tribune / Bob Pennell Photos of family history Christmas cards become precious as decades pass By JONEL ALECCIA Mail Tribune For every parent who ever wheedled a 3-year-old to stop crying before the family Christmas photo, Ann and Fitz Brewer of Medford have a word of advice: Relax. Those tear-stained cheeks that plague you now will be precious in a decade or two, says Ann. "Some years I looked at our pictures and I thought, ‘Oh, these are terrible,’ " she recalls. "Now as I look back on them, they don’t look quite so bad." And she has a lot to look back on. The well-known local couple are veterans of nearly 50 years of successive photo Christmas cards. More, if you count Ann’s family’s photos before she and Fitz were married. Advertisement From the first photo of the young couple in Germany in 1954 to this year’s snapshot near Canada’s Lake Louise, their annual cards have documented five decades of family life. The Brewers’ four kids grow from fat-cheeked babies to shaggy-haired teenagers to middle-aged parents themselves, all in a continuous Christmas context. "It’s something to see," says Fitz, a financial adviser with Strand Atkinson Williams & York in Medford. A lot of folks send family photo Christmas cards, but the 72-year-old Brewers likely hold the local record for longevity, said Joe Frodsham, owner of Frodsham’s photos. "They’ve got a family record all the way back, of how their family has changed and grown," says Frodsham, 53. "It shows where they are, what the family was like at Christmas." Sending photo Christmas cards was a family habit, Ann says. She has scrapbooks of her parents’ Christmas card photos carefully preserved from the 1930s and beyond. "My folks had one or two cards before I was born," she recalls. "And they did it every year after that. So we started doing it when we got married." The first Brewer clan photos were grainy black-and-white prints paired with a cheery holiday greeting. Over the years, times and technology changed. "In 1974, we went to color," Ann says. Many of the full-family shots were taken at various Thanksgivings. Over the years, as kids departed from home, the Brewers would create a collage of their kids. "When it got too tricky, we’d just do us," says Ann, noting that they plan to celebrate their golden anniversary in May. Now, the annual holiday card is expected by more than 200 family and friends, the Brewers say. "You start getting a lot of feedback. People told us they saved our cards over the years," says Ann. "So you can’t drop them; you have to keep going." As much as the Brewers enjoy sharing their family with relatives and friends, they figure a picture really is worth 1,000 words. "I’ve started putting a little label on the back saying what happened during the year," Ann says. "But it’s not a Christmas letter. I haven’t gone to that." Reach reporter JoNel Aleccia at 776-4465, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life Opinion - Politics | AP News | Archives | Site Map E Southern Oregon | Classified Copyright © 1997-2004 Mail Tribune. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy | Terms & Conditions Website Feedback 3 WEEKS FREE! ADVERTISERS A D V E R T I S E R S RESOURCES Oregon Road Conditions & Cams SPECIAL SECTIONS Auto Finder Job Finder Home Finder Joy Magazine Homelife Magazine Tempo Readers' Choice Real Estate Showcase Since We Asked Food for Thought Wellness Connection Outdoor Journal Moving to Southern Oregon? Volunteer Opportunities Prime Times