February has long been recognized as the month of love, culminating on February 14th when people around the world exchange cards, gifts, and flowers with friends and lovers.  The origin of this parton saint, St. Valentine, is shrouded in mystery, a combination of both Christian and Pagan traditions, going back to the ancient Romans.
The Catholic church recognizes three different saints named Valentine, or Valentinus, all of whom were martryed.  One legend involves a priest named Valentine during the reign of Claudius in the third century.    Supposedly, Claudius, realizing that single men made better soldiers than married men with families, outlawed marriage.
However, the priest, realizing the injustice of this, continued performing marriages in secret for young lovers.  When Cladius heard of this, he had the priest put to death.
Other stories suggest that Valentine may have been a young man put to death for helping Christians escape from Roman prisoners, where they were often beaten and tortured.
According to one legend, a man named Valentine was imprisoned where he fell in love with a young girl who visited him, perhaps his jailer's daughter. Before his death, he is credited with sending the first "valentine" when he wrote her a love letter, signing it "From Your Valentine", an expression that is still used today.
Whatever the murky origin may be, all the stories emphasize his image as a sympathetic and romantic figure.  Consequently, by the Middle Ages, St. Valentine became one of the most popular figures in France and England.
Different theories abound as to why we celebrate Valentine's Day on February 14th.  Some believe that it was the day St. Valentine (which one, I'm not sure) died or was buried about 270 A.D.
Others contend that the Christians set the date in an effort to "Christianize" the pagan holiday of Lupercalia, which was held on the Ides of February, the 15th.  Lupercalia was a holiday to honor the Roman god of agriculture, Faunus, and to celebrate the births of Romulus and Remus, the supposed founders of Rome.
Lupercalia survived the rise of Christianity but was outlawed in the fifth century when Pope Gelasius declared February 14th St. Valentine's Day.  Originally in France and England, the people believed it to be the beginning of the season that birds mated.
Though Valentine greetings were exchanged as far back as the Middle Ages, it was not until after 1400 with the invention of the printing press that written ones were sent.

The oldest known surviving valentine was written by Charles, Duke of Orleans, in 1415 to his wife while he was imprisoned in the Tower of London.  It is now part of the manuscript collection of the British library in London.
In Great Britain, Valentine's Day began to be popularly celebrated around the 17th century. By the middle of the 18th, it was common for friends and lovers of all social classes to exchange small tokens of affection or handwritten notes, and by 1900 printed cards began to replace written letters due to improvements in printing technology. Ready-made cards were an easy way for people to express their emotions in a time when direct expression of one's feelings was discouraged.
Americans probably began exchanging hand-made valentines in the early 1700s. In the 1840s, Esther A. Howland began selling the first mass-produced valentines in America. Howland, known as the “Mother of the Valentine,” made elaborate creations with real lace, ribbons and colorful pictures known as "scrap."
Today, according to the Greeting Card Association, an estimated 1 billion Valentine’s Day cards are sent each year, making Valentine's Day the second largest card-sending holiday of the year. (An estimated 2.6 billion cards are sent for Christmas.) Women purchase approximately 85 percent of all valentines.
Here's my vintage valentine to you....