Love Tokens on Valentine's Day

Who, of my ancestor couples, might have given or exchanged heart-and-hand love tokens?  These were common during the early 1800s but by the late 1800s it seems that postcards had won the hearts of most Valentine givers.  Perhaps ancestor couples who married before 1860?  (How I wish an original of one of these survived from that time period!)

The most likely couples are great-great-grandparents, named below with marriage year.
> William and Martha (Reay) Doyle, 1825
> William and Susanna (Holmes) Bickerstaff, 1830
> Robert and Elizabeth (Thompson) Laws, 1834
> Dixon and Rebecca (Smith) Bartley, 1836
> Jacob and Lydia (Fithen) Bell 1843
> Jacob and Mary (Richardson) Thompson, 1848
 
I'll never know whether these ancestors, or any ancestors before the 1950s, celebrated Valentine's Day, but I wish I did.

A Little of the History of Hearts-and-Hands
Hearts-and-hands were created and given as early as the late 1600s as tokens of affection on any day of the year.  By the 1700s they began to be adopted as expressions of affection on Valentine's Day.  By the mid-1800s Godey's Lady's Book and Harper's Weekly include Valentine's verses and cut paper projects.  Read more here, at the American Folk Art Museum website. 

I first saw these heart-and-hand paper cuts several decades ago in a magazine article, photo above, (though which magazine I can't say) and was enchanted.  The ones shown were, the author guessed, from the early 1800s.  I decided to try to create some of my own.  I gave most of them away and kept only the simplest ones.

Happy Valentine's Day, friends.

–Nancy.

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