Trade Card for Crown Sewing Machines and Florence Oil Stoves, Florence Machine Company, circa 1880

Summary

In the last third of the nineteenth century, an unprecedented variety of consumer goods and services flooded the American market. Advertisers, armed with new methods of color printing, bombarded potential customers with trade cards. Americans enjoyed and often saved the vibrant little advertisements found in product packages or distributed by local merchants. Many survive as historical records of commercialism in the United States.

In the last third of the nineteenth century, an unprecedented variety of consumer goods and services flooded the American market. Advertisers, armed with new methods of color printing, bombarded potential customers with trade cards. Americans enjoyed and often saved the vibrant little advertisements found in product packages or distributed by local merchants. Many survive as historical records of commercialism in the United States.

Artifact

Trade card

Date Made

circa 1880

Subject Date

circa 1880

Creators

Florence Machine Company 

Hill, O. D. 

Donaldson Brothers (Firm) 

Place of Creation

United States, Massachusetts, Florence 

United States, New York, Five Points 

Creator Notes

Advertised products made by Florence Machine Co., Florence, Massachusetts. Retailed by O.D. Hill, Florence, Massachusetts. Card lithographed by Donaldson Brothers, Five Points, New York

 On Exhibit

By Request in the Benson Ford Research Center

Object ID

86.7.2.1

Credit

From the Collections of The Henry Ford.

Material

Paper (Fiber product)

Color

Multicolored

Dimensions

Height: 3.25 in

Width: 5.5 in

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