Month: August 2019

August 31

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , ,

What was advertised in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Aug 31 - 8:31:1769 Massachusetts Gazette Draper
Massachusetts Gazette [Draper] (August 31, 1769).
“The Store … was broke open and rob’d.”

The August 31, 1769, edition of Richard Draper’s Massachusetts Gazette included several advertisements for consumer goods. John Gerrish advertised a “very large Assortment of Goods, and Merchandize.” Other advertisers specialized in retail sales of particular kinds of goods: Zechariah Fowle advertised books, Peter Roberts “Drugs & Medicines,” and Richard Smith spermaceti candles “Manufactured by Daniel Jenckes & Com. at Providence.” Other advertisers promoted upcoming auctions, such as Joseph Russell’s notice for a “Variety of Houshold Furniture” intended for sale “by PUBLIC VENDUE” a week later. Still others announced estate sales, giving readers an opportunity to purchase secondhand goods.

Yet retail sales, auctions, and estate sales were not the only means of acquiring goods and participating in the consumer revolution that was taking place in the colonies and throughout the British Atlantic world. Another advertisement reported that someone “broke open and rob’d” the store belonging to Benjamin Greene and Son earlier in the month. Several pieces of merchandise went missing, including handkerchiefs, sewing silk, “Mens Hose,” and assorted textiles. Greene and Son offered a reward to “Whoever will discover the Thieves so that they may be brought to Justice.”

Unfortunately for retailers and residents of Boston and other cities and towns throughout the colonies, Greene and Son’s advertisement was not particularly unusual. Similar advertisements appeared regularly in the public prints, suggesting that those who could not participate in consumer culture through legitimate means resorted to other methods of acquiring the goods they desired. The “sundry small Articles” taken from Greene and Son’s store likely ended up in the hands of colonists other than the thieves, passing through a black market or, as Serena Zabin has termed it, an “informal economy” for distributing goods of questionable provenance. The reach of the consumer revolution extended far beyond the gentry and the middling sort; it encompassed colonists of all backgrounds. Those who lacked the means to visit the shops, auction houses, and estate sales advertised in the Massachusetts Gazette and other newspapers devised other ways of obtaining consumer goods.

Slavery Advertisements Published August 31, 1769

Carl Robert Keyes Slavery Adverts 250 Project

The Slavery Adverts 250 Project chronicles the role of newspaper advertising in perpetuating slavery in the era of the American Revolution. The project seeks to reveal the ubiquity of slavery in eighteenth-century life from New England to Georgia by republishing advertisements for slaves – for sale, wanted to purchase, runaways, captured fugitives – in daily digests on this site as well as in real time via the @SlaveAdverts250 Twitter feed, utilizing twenty-first-century media to stand in for the print media of the eighteenth century.

The project aims to provide modern audiences with a sense of just how often colonists encountered these advertisements in their daily lives. Enslaved men, women, and children appeared in print somewhere in the colonies almost every single day. Those advertisements served as a constant backdrop for social, cultural, economic, and political life in colonial and revolutionary America. Colonists who did not own slaves were still confronted with slavery as well as invited to maintain the system by purchasing slaves or assisting in the capture of runaways. The frequency of these newspaper advertisements suggests just how embedded slavery was in colonial and revolutionary American culture in everyday interactions beyond the printed page.

These advertisements also testify to the experiences of enslaved men, women, and children, though readers must consider that those experiences have been remediated through descriptions offered by slaveholders rather than the slaves themselves. Often unnamed in the advertisements, enslaved men, women, and children were not invisible or unimportant in early America.

These advertisements appeared in colonial American newspapers 250 years ago today.

Aug 31 - Boston Chronicle Slavery 1
Boston Chronicle (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - Massachusetts Gazette Draper Slavery 1
Massachusetts Gazette [Draper] (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - Massachusetts Gazette Draper Slavery 2
Massachusetts Gazette [Draper] (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - Massachusetts Gazette Draper Slavery 3
Massachusetts Gazette [Draper] (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - Massachusetts Gazette Draper Slavery 4
Massachusetts Gazette [Draper] (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - Massachusetts Gazette Draper Slavery 5
Massachusetts Gazette [Draper] (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - Pennsylvania Gazette Slavery 1
Pennsylvania Gazette (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - South-Carolina Gazette Slavery 1
South-Carolina Gazette (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - South-Carolina Gazette Slavery 2
South-Carolina Gazette (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - South-Carolina Gazette Slavery 3
South-Carolina Gazette (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - South-Carolina Gazette Slavery 4
South-Carolina Gazette (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - South-Carolina Gazette Slavery 5
South-Carolina Gazette (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - South-Carolina Gazette Slavery 6
South-Carolina Gazette (August 31, 1769).

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Aug 31 - South-Carolina Gazette Slavery 7
South-Carolina Gazette (August 31, 1769).

August 30

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , ,

What was advertised in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Aug 30 - 8:30:1769 South-Carolina and American General Gazette
South-Carolina and American General Gazette (August 30, 1769).

“To be sold …”

Like most other newspaper published in the colonial era, a standard issue of the South-Carolina and American General Gazette consisted of four pages created by printing two pages on each side of a broadsheet and folding it in half. Robert Wells, the printer, distributed a four-page issue once a week. On occasion, however, Wells had too much content – news, editorials, advertisements, to include in the standard issue. In order to publish the latest intelligence and paid notices in a timely manner, he supplemented the standard issue with an additional sheet.

Such was the case with the August 30, 1769, edition of the South-Carolina and American General Gazette. It consisted of six pages, the standard four-page issue and another sheet with one page printed on either side. When other printers resorted to this means of increasing the length of an issue, many tended to distribute an additional half sheet that included a masthead that read “Supplement to the …” The half sheet thus matched the size of rest of the issue. It maintained the same format as the standard issue. Wells, on the other hand, distributed his supplemental pages on smaller sheets.

Consider the format of a standard issue of the South-Carolina and American General Gazette. Four columns spanned the page. The supplemental sheet that accompanied the August 30 edition did not bear a separate masthead. Instead, the title ran across the top, as it did on every page, and the numbering continued uninterrupted, making a date unnecessary. The additional sheet featured two columns that ran vertically and a narrower third column that rotated the text of the advertisements ninety degrees in order to make them fit on the page. Why do this? It avoided the time and effort of resetting type for notices that previously appeared in other issues. Wells and the compositor devised a system that allowed them to cover every square inch of the supplementary sheet with content. It avoided wasting any paper when they did not have enough content to fill an entire half sheet, especially important now that paper was in short supply due to the import taxes levied by the Townshend Acts. The supplemental sheet did not match the rest of the issue in its appearance, but it was an efficient way to circulate all the news and advertising received in Wells’s printing office that week.

Unfortunately, working with digital surrogates for the original sources does not allow for exact measurements of the standard issue and the supplementary sheet. Accessible Archives and its counterparts do not include that sort of metadata, in large part because it would be prohibitively expense to do so. The size of both sorts of pages – the standard issue and the supplement – appear the same when viewed in digital format, even though visual evidence demonstrates that the printer used sheets of very different sizes. Digitized primary sources allow for greater accessibility, but they cannot answer every question. Scholars and others must remember that digitized sources are supplements to, rather than replacements for, the original documents.

Slavery Advertisements Published August 30, 1769

Carl Robert Keyes Slavery Adverts 250 Project

The Slavery Adverts 250 Project chronicles the role of newspaper advertising in perpetuating slavery in the era of the American Revolution. The project seeks to reveal the ubiquity of slavery in eighteenth-century life from New England to Georgia by republishing advertisements for slaves – for sale, wanted to purchase, runaways, captured fugitives – in daily digests on this site as well as in real time via the @SlaveAdverts250 Twitter feed, utilizing twenty-first-century media to stand in for the print media of the eighteenth century.

The project aims to provide modern audiences with a sense of just how often colonists encountered these advertisements in their daily lives. Enslaved men, women, and children appeared in print somewhere in the colonies almost every single day. Those advertisements served as a constant backdrop for social, cultural, economic, and political life in colonial and revolutionary America. Colonists who did not own slaves were still confronted with slavery as well as invited to maintain the system by purchasing slaves or assisting in the capture of runaways. The frequency of these newspaper advertisements suggests just how embedded slavery was in colonial and revolutionary American culture in everyday interactions beyond the printed page.

These advertisements also testify to the experiences of enslaved men, women, and children, though readers must consider that those experiences have been remediated through descriptions offered by slaveholders rather than the slaves themselves. Often unnamed in the advertisements, enslaved men, women, and children were not invisible or unimportant in early America.

These advertisements appeared in colonial American newspapers 250 years ago today.

Aug 30 - Georgia Gazette Slavery 1
Georgia Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - Georgia Gazette Slavery 2
Georgia Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - Georgia Gazette Slavery 3
Georgia Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - Georgia Gazette Slavery 4
Georgia Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - South-Carolina and American General Gazette Slavery 1
South-Carolina and American General Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - South-Carolina and American General Gazette Slavery 2
South-Carolina and American General Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - South-Carolina and American General Gazette Slavery 3
South-Carolina and American General Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - South-Carolina and American General Gazette Slavery 4
South-Carolina and American General Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - South-Carolina and American General Gazette Slavery 5
South-Carolina and American General Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - South-Carolina and American General Gazette Slavery 6
South-Carolina and American General Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - South-Carolina and American General Gazette Slavery 7
South-Carolina and American General Gazette (August 30, 1769).

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Aug 30 - South-Carolina and American General Gazette Slavery 8
South-Carolina and American General Gazette (August 30, 1769).

August 29

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , ,

What was advertised in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Aug 29 - 8:29:1769 Essex Gazette
Essex Gazette (August 29, 1769).

“He proposes to carry on Wig-making and Hair-Dressing.”

Fashion helped to fuel the consumer revolution of the eighteenth century. Consumers devoted great attention to changing styles and purchased garments, accessories, and accouterments to match trends as they changed. Colonists in the largest port cities looked to London for guidance, while colonists in smaller towns looked to both London and urban ports like Boston, Charleston, New York, and Philadelphia. Fixations on fashion were not confined to the better sort in urban centers. Middling folk and others in towns from New England to Georgia also participated in the rituals and display that made the consumer revolution a very visible aspect of life in the colonies.

Like others who earned their livelihoods by providing goods and services to consumers, Alexander Cambell realized that markets extended into the countryside. In late August 1769, he inserted an advertisement in the Essex Gazette to announce that he had just opened a shop in Marblehead where he “carr[ied] on Wig-making and Hair-Dressing” for the ladies and gentlemen of that town. Cambell did not elaborate extensively on the services he provided, but he did promise that prospective clients “may depend upon the best Attendance” when they employed him.

Cambell’s wigs were embedded in networks of exchange. Colonists glimpsed those extensive webs of commerce that played such a significant role in the consumer revolution when they read the Essex Gazette and saw Cambell’s advertisement nestled in the middle of a column that began with the shipping news from the customs house for the port of Salem and Marblehead and ended with the shipping news from the customs house in Boston. Cambell’s work as wigmaker and hairdresser did not occur in isolation in Marblehead; instead, his shop was a local manifestation of a consumer revolution that was taking place throughout the British Atlantic world and beyond. The vessels listed in the shipping news carried finished goods or the materials for producing them, but they also carried news and information, including updates about changing fashions. Widespread circulation of these updates cultivated interest in changing trends and other aspects of the consumer revolution in even the smallest towns. As part of that process, Cambell identified a potential market for making and selling wigs and dressing hair in Marblehead; he published an advertisement to offer his services and to incite even greater demand in the summer of 1769.

August 28

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , , , , ,

What was advertised in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Aug 28 - 8:28:1769 Boston-Gazette
Boston-Gazette (August 28, 1769).

“Tavern at the King’s Arms on Boston Neck.”

In the summer of 1769, the George Tavern on Boston Neck became the Tavern at the King’s Arms. When Edward Bardin of New York acquired the property from Gideon Gardiner, he rebranded the business as part of his efforts to “merit Favour” from prospective patrons. The establishment Bardin described in advertisements that ran in the Boston-Gazette and the Boston Post-Boy offered amenities for both “Ladies and Gentlemen,” including a garden “prepared … in an elegant Manner.” This was not a tavern for raucous drinking but instead a place to gather for leisurely dining, drinking, and conversation. In addition to “an Assortment of neat Wines … and other Liquors,” Bardin supplied the “best Tea and Coffee … to accommodate his Customers.” If they preferred, ladies and gentleman could enjoy “New-York Mead and Cakes” instead of tea or coffee.

To aid prospective patrons in visiting the new Tavern at the King’s Arms, Bardin arranged for a shuttle service that ran between “Capt. Paddock’s, Coach-Maker in Common Street” and the tavern. He advised potential customers that he had “prepared a commodious Coach to wait upon any Ladies or Gentlemen, from 3 o’Clock till 4 in the Afternoon.” Those who did not wish to board the carriage at Paddock’s shop could instead be picked up “at any other Place in Town,” provided that they gave sufficient notice when sending their requests. Not only could patrons enjoy the many amenities of the Tavern at the King’s Arms during their visit, they could also travel there in style in the “commodious Coach.” Bardin and Paddock charged one shilling per person for a round trip.

The new proprietor of the tavern offered another convenience for consumers: take out food. In addition to serving breakfast in the morning, dinner at midday, and supper in the evening, he also prepared “hot Chicken Pies for ready Suppers” for “Customers who are pleased to send for them.”   Bardin opened his advertisement pledging “to merit Favour by a constant and diligent Application” to the “Command” of the “Ladies and Gentlemen of the Town of Boston.” To that end, he offered a variety of amenities and conveniences for prospective patrons to enjoy, including gardens, an assortment of food and beverages, shuttle service to and from the tavern, and take out food for those unable to dine at his establishment. Bardin not only promised hospitality, he also helped prospective customers envision what they could expect to experience at the new Tavern at the King’s Arms.

Slavery Advertisements Published August 28, 1769

Carl Robert Keyes Slavery Adverts 250 Project

The Slavery Adverts 250 Project chronicles the role of newspaper advertising in perpetuating slavery in the era of the American Revolution. The project seeks to reveal the ubiquity of slavery in eighteenth-century life from New England to Georgia by republishing advertisements for slaves – for sale, wanted to purchase, runaways, captured fugitives – in daily digests on this site as well as in real time via the @SlaveAdverts250 Twitter feed, utilizing twenty-first-century media to stand in for the print media of the eighteenth century.

The project aims to provide modern audiences with a sense of just how often colonists encountered these advertisements in their daily lives. Enslaved men, women, and children appeared in print somewhere in the colonies almost every single day. Those advertisements served as a constant backdrop for social, cultural, economic, and political life in colonial and revolutionary America. Colonists who did not own slaves were still confronted with slavery as well as invited to maintain the system by purchasing slaves or assisting in the capture of runaways. The frequency of these newspaper advertisements suggests just how embedded slavery was in colonial and revolutionary American culture in everyday interactions beyond the printed page.

These advertisements also testify to the experiences of enslaved men, women, and children, though readers must consider that those experiences have been remediated through descriptions offered by slaveholders rather than the slaves themselves. Often unnamed in the advertisements, enslaved men, women, and children were not invisible or unimportant in early America.

These advertisements appeared in colonial American newspapers 250 years ago today.

Aug 28 - Boston Evening-Post Slavery 1
Boston Evening-Post (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - Boston Evening-Post Slavery 2
Boston Evening-Post (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - Boston-Gazette Slavery 1
Boston-Gazette (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - Boston-Gazette Slavery 2
Boston-Gazette (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - Boston-Gazette Slavery 3
Boston-Gazette (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - Boston-Gazette Slavery 4
Boston-Gazette (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - Massachusetts Gazette Green and Russell Slavery 1
Massachusetts Gazette [Green and Russell] (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury Slavery 1
New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury Slavery 2
New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury Slavery 3
New-York Gazette and Weekly Mercury (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - New-York Gazette or Weekly Post-Boy Slavery 1
New-York Gazette or Weekly Post-Boy (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - New-York Gazette or Weekly Post-Boy Slavery 2
New-York Gazette or Weekly Post-Boy (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - Newport Mercury Slavery 1
Newport Mercury (August 28, 1769).

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Aug 28 - Newport Mercury Slavery 2
Newport Mercury (August 28, 1769).

August 27

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

What was advertised in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago this week?

Aug 27 - 8:24:1769 South-Carolina Gazette
South-Carolina Gazette (August 24, 1769).

“He is determined … not to import any more Goods.”

In August 1769, Joshua Lockwood promoted “A VERY neat Assortment of CLOCKS and WATCHES” that he had “just imported … from LONDON.” He also carried “a large and neat Assortment of Silver and Metal-Mounted Holster, Saddle, and Pocket-Pistols.” He was careful, however, not to run afoul of the resolutions recently adopted by merchants and traders in Charleston, a nonimportation agreement similar to those already in effect in Boston and New York. In several of the largest urban ports, colonists leveraged economic resistance to the Townshend Acts, vowing not to import a vast array of goods from Britain while Parliament levied taxes on imported paper, tea, glass, lead, and paint. For his part, Lockwood alerted the public that he “is determined, and bound by Honour, and for the Good of the Country, until the late villainous Impositions laid upon us are taken off.” The watchmaker established for prospective customers and the community that he supported the nonimportation agreement, wedding commerce and politics in his advertisement.

Lockwood joined other merchants, shopkeepers, and artisans who attempted to leverage the nonimportation agreement to sway consumers with their political sentiments. Unlike others, however, he used the boycott for another purpose: calling in debts. Lockwood anticipated that the tradesmen on the other side of the Atlantic who supplied his clocks and watches would demand “a Settlement” once he suspended placing new orders. They would not extend credit indefinitely to a customer who no longer actively purchased their wares. To pay his own bills, Lockwood called on “his Friends and Customers” to settle their accounts with him. He offered several months to do so, but warned that he would sue those who were “not so kind as to comply with his Request” by the first of the year. Newspapers from New England to Georgia carried advertisements that called on colonists to pay debts or end up in court. In that regard, Lockwood’s notice was not extraordinary. Using the nonimportation agreement as a means of encouraging those who owed him money to settle accounts, on the other hand, was innovative. He sought to harness (or exploit) a political movement for the benefit of his business in a new way. Plenty of advertisers asked consumers to patronize their shops because they supported nonimportation, but they did not use the boycott as a justification for calling in debts. What were the ramifications for Lockwood? Did readers find themselves in sympathy and more inclined to pay their debts to alleviate any hardships Lockwood might face as a result of suspending his orders from Britain? Or did they question Lockwood’s commitment to making a sacrifice on behalf of the cause and resent his effort to use the nonimportation agreement as rationale for taking colonists to court?

August 26

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , ,

What was advertised in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Aug 26 - 8:26:1769 Providence Gazette
Providence Gazette (August 26, 1769).

“Once more!”

In the August 26, 1769, edition of the Providence Gazette, Knight Dexter and Samuel Nightingale, Jr., both placed advertisements calling on those who owed them money to settle accounts or risk being sued. When it came to attracting the attention of readers, however, Dexter deployed much more effective typography that included a striking headline.

Compare the two advertisements, staring with the standard format adopted by Nightingale. “ALL Persons indebted to SAMUEL NIGHTINGALE, jun. by Book, Note, &c. are once more earnestly intreated to make immediate Payment.” The advertisement continued from there with the threat of legal action and a shorter paragraph that promoted the “large Assortment of European and West-India GOODS” in stock at Nightingale’s shop. The shopkeeper’s name and “GOODS” were the only words that appeared in all capitals. None of the text in the advertisement ran in a larger font. Visually, little distinguished it from other advertisements or other content in the issue.

On the other hand, Dexter’s advertisement opened with a headline that demanded attention: “Once more!” The font for the headline was even larger than that used for “PROVIDENCE GAZETTE” in the masthead on the front page. Elsewhere in the issue, only prolific advertisers Joseph Russell and William Russell used a font notable for being larger than anything else on the page; their names ran in font the same size as “PROVIDENCE GAZETTE” in the masthead. “Once more!” appeared in the largest font by far on the third page and the second page that faced it, making it difficult to miss. Such unique typography likely incited curiosity and prompted readers to investigate further and find out more about the advertisement.

Although unusual, the typography was not completely unique. In December 1768, Joseph Olney, Jr., and Jonathan Arnold, executors of the estate of Joseph Smith, ran an advertisement calling on creditors to settle their debts and advising the community of an estate auction. The advertisement featured the “Once more!” headline in oversized font. It ran in the Providence Gazette. Perhaps Dexter, who advertised frequently in that newspaper, remembered that advertisement and incorporated its distinctive feature into his own advertising several months later. Alternately, perhaps the printer or compositor recommended the striking device to Dexter when he expressed concern about attracting as much attention to the advertisement as possible. Either way, this innovation that originated in the Providence Gazette did not disappear after its first use. It reappeared within a year, heralding a practice that became common in newspaper advertising in the nineteenth century.

August 25

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , , , ,

What was advertised in a colonial American newspaper 250 years ago today?

Aug 25 - 8:25:1769 New-London Gazette
New-London Gazette (August 25, 1769).

“Work done as well as in any other Part of New-England.”

Even though he operated a shop in the relatively small town of New London, goldsmith and jeweler Robert Douglass, Jr., sought to convince prospective customers that he provided goods and services that rivaled those offered by his counterparts in larger cities. In an advertisement inserted in the August 25, 1769, edition of the New-London Gazette, he emphasized that he “makes and sells all Kinds of Goldsmith’s and Jeweller’s Work, as cheap as can be bought in Boston or New-York.” Prospective customers did not need to send away to shops in those busy ports to find good deals, nor did they need to suspect that Douglass engaged in price gouging as a result of being some distance from urban centers with greater numbers of goldsmiths and jewelers who kept down their prices as they competed with each other.

In addition to making an appeal to price, Douglass pledged that “Whoever will please to favour [him] with their Custom, may depend on having their Work done as well as in any other Part of New-England.” Prospective customers also did not have to fret that they sacrificed quality when they chose to deal with a local goldsmith and jeweler. Douglass positioned his skills and expertise in direct competition with his counterparts in Newport, Portsmouth, Providence, and even Boston. Having invoked New York when it came to price, he also implied that his work rivaled that done by goldsmiths and jewelers there.

To further entice prospective clients to visit his shop, Douglass introduced a new employee. James Watson, “who makes and repairs all Kinds of Clocks and Watches in the neatest and best Manner,” had just arrived from London. His presence in Douglass’s shop linked it to the most cosmopolitan city in the British Empire. Local customers did not have to worry that they had settled for what was available when they visited Douglass’s shop. Instead, the goldsmith and jeweler suggested, they patronized an establishment on par with those in the largest cities in the colonies and even the metropolis of London. Despite ongoing disputes over the Townshend Acts, many colonial consumers still looked to London as a center of taste and gentility.

Douglass incorporated several common marketing strategies in his advertisement: price, quality, and connections to the most cosmopolitan city in the empire. He adapted each appeal to address anxieties about hiring a goldsmith and jeweler located in a small town, assuring prospective customers that the goods and services from his shop matched those from other shops in larger towns and cities. Local customers did not need to look beyond New London to discover remarkable value when they wished to hire a goldsmith, jeweler, or watchmaker.