Boston Evening-Post

June 20

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

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

Supplement to the Boston-Gazette (June 14, 1773).

“UMBRILLOES.”

Isaac Greenwood may not have believed that imitation was the sincerest form of flattery when John Cutler decided to run advertisements adorned with a woodcut that closely replicated the image of genteel woman shaded by an umbrella that he had included in many of his advertisements for the past couple of years.  Greenwood first used the image in May 1771 and continued incorporating it into his newspaper notices in 1772 and 1773.  In the summer of 1773, he launched a new advertising campaign that featured the woodcut and the headline “NOT IMPORTED” to underscore that he made the “UMBRILLOES” he sold while simultaneously encouraging consumers to support domestic manufactures by choosing them over imported alternatives.

Boston Evening-Post (June 14, 1773).

Cutler also made “Umbrilloes of all sorts for Ladies and Gentlemen … in the best Manner.”  In addition, he “mended and covered” old umbrellas.  As Greenwood’s latest advertisement with the image of the woman and umbrella appeared in supplement that accompanied the June 14 edition of the Boston-Gazette, Cutler debuted his strikingly similar woodcut in an advertisement in the Boston Evening-Post on the same day.  He then took the rather extraordinary step of having the woodcut transferred to the printing offices of the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter in time to run in the June 17 edition.  Such transfers continued for the next several weeks as Cutler increased the exposure for the image by inserting it in more than one newspaper.

Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter (June 17, 1773).

Some prospective customers may have considered the woman depicted in Cutler’s advertisements more elegant than the one in Greenwood’s notices.  Both wore necklaces.  In the original image, the necklace hugged the woman’s chin, making it difficult to distinguish, while in the imitation the necklace hung lower on the woman’s neck and featured a pendant that enhanced it.  The original image offered a view of the woman’s decolletage, while the imitation placed greater emphasis on embroidery and other adornments.  The hairstyles differed as well.  The woman in the original image wore a high roll, but some viewers may have mistaken it for a turban.  In the imitation, the woman had her hair pile high upon her head, but the image suggested elaborate curls and even a tendril that hung below her right ear to frame her face.

In several ways, Cutler’s new image was superior to the familiar one that Greenwood had circulated for more than two years.  Cutler could have chosen another image to represent his business in the public prints.  After all, he advised prospective customers that he made umbrellas “at the Golden Cock, in Marlborough Street.”  Some advertisers experimented with branding and logos in the late eighteenth century, consistently associating an image with their shops and their goods.  Greenwood may not have been very happy that Cutler devised an image that so closely resembled the one that already represented his business.

May 24

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

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

Boston Evening-Post (May 24, 1773).

“A sprightly, active BOY … not much inclined to Macaronism, is wanted as an Apprentice.”

Thomas Fleet and John Fleet sought an apprentice to assist in their printing office at the Heart and Crown in Boston.  On May 24, 1773, the printers placed a notice in their own newspaper, the Boston Evening-Post, to advise readers that a “sprightly, active BOY, that can read and write, & not much inclined to Macaronism, is wanted as an Apprentice to the Printing Business.”

Most of those credentials make sense to modern readers.  The work undertaken in a printing office was physically demanding, so the Fleets needed a “sprightly, active” apprentice who was up to the challenge.  That apprentice would also assist in setting type and perhaps with some of the bookkeeping, making the ability to read and write almost essential (though some apprentices did learn to read in the process of setting type).  But what about a prospective apprentice “not much inclined to Macaronism”?

In that instance, the Fleets used a slang term recognized by eighteenth-century readers.  They did not seek a “Macaroni” or, as the Oxford English Dictionary explains, a “dandy or fop [who] extravagantly imitated Continental tastes and fashions.”  The OED also includes an example of “Macaroni” in use in 1770, revealing the derision bestowed on the young men who adopted the style: “There is indeed a kind of animal, neither male nor female, a thing of the neuter gender, lately started up amongst us.  It is called a Macaroni.  It talks without meaning, it smiles without pleasantry, it eats without appetite, it rides without exercise, it wenches without passion.”  In the colonies as in Britain, Macaronis participated in the consumer revolution to excess, wallowing in luxury and vice.

Such a character would not do in a printing office … and the Fleets did not want their business to become the venue for parents to attempt to correct such behaviors demonstrated by sons of an appropriate age to enter into apprenticeship agreements.  Many other employment advertisements of the era included “sober” (or, turning to the OED once again, “moderate in demeanour … indicating or implying a serious mind or purpose”) as one of the credentials.  The Fleets could have included “sober” in their notice, but perhaps they had recent encounters with Macaronis that made them particularly cautious about bringing an apprentice with such proclivities into their printing office.  They made it clear that Macaronis need not apply at the Heart and Crown.

April 19

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Boston Evening-Post (April 19, 1773).

“Those who are acquainted with his Prices, will not need to be told that he sells at low Rates.”

Samuel Eliot made consumer choice and low prices the centerpieces of the advertisement he inserted in the April 19, 1773, edition of the Boston Evening-Post.  He first established that he stocked a “very fine Assortment of English and India Piece GOODS.”  He also stated that his inventory included a “Variety of Genteel Looking-Glasses” as well as “Stationary, Cutlery, and Hard Ware.”  He did not provide as extensive a list of individual items as Caleb Blanchard did for his “large and general Assortment of English and India GOODS” or Daniel Waldo did for his “compleat Assortment of London, Bristol, Birmingham, and Sheffield Hard Ware Goods,” but he did conclude with “&c. &c.” (an abbreviation for et cetera) to indicate that he sold goods beyond those that appeared in his advertisement.

Rather than listing dozens of items like some of his competitors, Eliot devoted more attention to promoting his prices.  In a paragraph that appeared in italics, he declared, “Those who are acquainted with his Prices, will not need to be told that he sells at low Rates.”  Even though they did not need to be told, Eliot offered a reminder that simultaneously presented an opening for elaborating on his prices for “those who are not” already aware of the bargains he offered.  He invited them “to call on him,” confidently asserting that once they visited his shop near Dock Square or his store on Wilson’s Lane they “shall be satisfied he makes no idle Profession, when he engages to sell his Goods on the most reasonable Terms.”  Eliot suggested that he set such low prices that many consumers already associated good deals with his merchandise.  For those not already aware, he issued a challenge to confirm his “low Rates” for themselves.  Getting prospective customers into one of his locations, Eliot likely surmised, increased the chances of making sales, especially if his prices were indeed as low as he suggested.  Other merchants and shopkeepers, like Ebenezer Storer, made passing references to “the lowest Rates” for their goods.  Eliot, in contrast, encouraged engagement with readers of the Boston Evening-Post by creating a narrative around his prices.

April 5

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Boston Evening-Post (April 5, 1773).

“No Good will be received by him of any Servants or Minors.”

Martin Bicker launched a new enterprise in Boston in the early 1770s.  He offered his services as a broker who “receive[s] in all sorts of English and Scotch Goods, Houshold Furniture,” and other items and “does engage to raise the Cash for such Goods delivered [to] him for Sale.”  In so doing, he put himself in competition most directly with auctioneers in the city, though he also gave consumers another alternative to buying from shopkeepers.  Retailers also had the option to purchase wares from Bicker rather than from merchants.  Still, Bicker positioned him services primarily as an alternative to those provided by auctioneers in the city.  In an advertisement in the April 5, 1773, edition of the Boston Evening-Post, he declared that he paid cash for goods that clients entrusted to him “with as quick Dispatch and to good Advantage as can be done at any Auction whatever.”  In addition, he concluded with a nota bene directed at buyers, declaring that he “has for Sale a Variety of English and other Goods, which may be had as cheap as at any VENDUE” or auction.  Bicker noted that he ran his brokerage “At the RED FLAG,” a symbol usually associated with auctions but appropriated here for his own purposes.

Given that the broker offered secondhand goods for sale, he aimed to reassure the public that he did not peddle stolen items.  Bicker stopped short of allowing others to examine his ledgers, but he did promise that “no Goods will be received by him of any Servants or Minors.”  That meant that he did not accept items delivered by all sorts of free and unfree laborers who fell within the category of servants, including indentured servants, apprentices, and enslaved men and women.  Bicker realized that these subordinates sometimes stole goods from their employers, masters, or enslavers and then sold or traded them.  He also refused items from children and youth who similarly lacked authority when it came to disposing of goods.  In his efforts to make his brokerage a success, Bicker pursued two strategies in his advertisement.  He presented his services as equal to those in the auction houses already familiar to residents of Boston while simultaneously encouraging confidence in his integrity as an honest dealer who did not accept any and all merchandise sent his way.  Instead, he exercised appropriate discretion that testified to his overall trustworthiness.

March 22

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

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

Boston-Gazette (March 22, 1773).

“An ORATION … to COMMEMORATE the BLOODY TRAGEDY of the FIFTH of MARCH 1770.”

Within a week of Benjamin Edes and John Gill announcing that “Dr. CHURCH’S ORATION will be Published by the Printers hereof as soon as possible,” advertisements for that pamphlet appeared in three of Boston’s newspapers.  Edes and Gill referred to the address that Dr. Benjamin Church delivered “At the Request of the Inhabitants of the Town of BOSTON” on the third anniversary of the Boston Massacre “to COMMEMORATE the BLOODY TRAGEDY.”  Edes and Gill reported on the commemorations in their newspaper, the Boston-Gazette, on March 8, 1773, reporting that Church spoke about “the dangerous Tendency of Standing Armies” to the “universal Applause of his Audience.”  Furthermore, “his Fellow Citizens voted him their Thanks, and unanimously requested a Copy of his Oration for the Press.”  In the next weekly issue of the Boston-Gazette, Edes and Gill advised the public that they would soon publish Church’s Oration.

Boston Evening-Post (March 22, 1773).

Three days later, the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter carried a notice that the “THIRD EDITION, corrected by the AUTHOR” was “Just Publish’d” and sold by Edes and Gill as well as Thomas Fleet and John Fleet, the printers of the Boston Evening-Post.  Apparently, Joseph Greenleaf was the first printer to take Church’s Oration to press, but Edes and Gill produced a superior edition.  In promoting the third edition, the printers gave their advertisement a privileged place in the Boston-Gazette.  It appeared as the first item in the first column on the first page of the March 22 issue, making it difficult for readers to overlook.  The same day, the Fleets ran the same notice in the Boston Evening-Post.  Although not as prominently displayed as in the Boston-Gazette, the placement likely received special attention.  Rather than nestled among the dozens of advertisements on the third and fourth pages, it ran as the sole advertisement on the second page.  As readers moved from “Proceedings of the Town of Westminster” to news from London that arrived in the colonies via New York, they encountered the advertisement for Church’s Oration.  In its own way, that notice served as news, continuing the coverage of current events and shaping how colonizers viewed their place within the empire.

February 21

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

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

Boston Evening-Post (February 15, 1773).

“Early Charlton, early Hotspur, early Golden Hotspur.”

For colonizers in Boston and nearby towns, it was a sign that spring was coming!  The first advertisement for garden seeds appeared in local newspapers on February 15, 1773.  In the late 1760s and the early 1770s, seed sellers, most of them women, took to the pages of the public prints to advertise their wares when they believed that winter passed its halfway point.  Susanna Renken was the first in 1773, just as she had been in 1768 and 1770.  Soon, several other women who advertised seeds each year would join her, as would a smaller number of men.  Indeed, shopkeeper John Adams placed the second advertisement for seeds in newspapers printed in Boston in 1773, but it did not take long for women to outnumber him with their advertisements.

Renken, already familiar to many readers in part due to her annual advertising campaign, had the market to her herself for a few days.  On February 15, she ran notices with identical copy in two of the three newspapers published in Boston that day, the Boston Evening-Post and the Boston-Gazette.  She focused primarily on a long list of seeds, but concluded by mentioning some grocery items, a “Variety of China Bowls and Dishes,” and an “Assortment of India and English Goods.”  Most of her female competitors usually did not promote other items, but Renken recognized an opportunity to encourage other sales, especially if customers were not quite ready to purchase garden seeds in the middle of February.  After all, many of the headlines in other advertisements still hawked “WINTER GOODS.

Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter (February 18, 1773).

She had the public prints to herself for only three days.  Adams inserted his advertisement in the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter on February 18.  Renken did not expand her advertising to that newspaper or the Massachusetts Spy.  Her next notices ran once again in the Boston Evening-Post and the Boston-Gazette and, for the first time that year, the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Post-Boy on February 22.  Other women who participated in the annual ritual joined her on that day, Elizabeth Clark and Nowell, Elizabeth Dyar, and Elizabeth Greenleaf in the Supplement to the Boston-Gazette and Elizabeth Greenleaf in the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Post-Boy.  Ebenezer Oliver, who inherited the business from his mother, Bethiah Oliver, and invoked her name in his notice, also advertised in the Supplement to the Boston-Gazette, as did John Adams.  A few days later, John Adams, Elizabeth Greenleaf, and Ebenezer Oliver advertised in the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter and Lydia Dyar, Elizabeth Greenleaf, and Anna Johnson advertised in the Massachusetts Spy on February 25.  By then, Renken decided that she would increase the number of newspapers carrying her advertisements, perhaps after noticing that her competitors launched their campaigns.  She also placed a notice in the February 25 edition of the Massachusetts Spy.  For a few days Renken was the sole seed seller promoting her merchandise in Boston’s newspapers, but it soon became a very crowded field.

August 24

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Boston Evening-Post (August 24, 1772).

“At the Sign of the STAGE COACH and FOUR on the one Side, and MAN and HORSE on the other.”

Shop signs identified a variety of businesses in colonial Boston.  Thomas Fleet and John Fleet, printers of the Boston Evening-Post, operated their printing office at the Sign of the Heart and Crown, a symbol so synonymous with their business that in an advertisement in the August 24, 1772, edition they advised readers of “Paper, To be Sold at the Heart& Crown” without giving any other details about the location.

In the same issue, Edward Wentworth, Jr., included two shop signs in his advertisement for a “Variety Shop” where he sold “All Sorts of West-India Goods, and many other Articles in the Grocery Way.”  He indicated that customers could find the shop “at the Sign of the STAGE COACH and FOUR on the one Side, and MAN and HORSE on the other,” perhaps appropriating signs that marked other businesses in directing customers to the “Variety Shop.”  The remainder of the advertisement suggests that Wentworth ran one or both of those other businesses as well.  He offered “Victualling, Lodging & Boarding for Gentlemen and good Keeping for Horses” as well as “Horses and Carriages to Let.”  The “Variety Shop” may have been a new venture, one that did not yet merit its own sign since others already marked its location.

Wentworth may have been quite content to stick with signs already familiar to residents of the South End, images they associated with his reputation, rather than hanging yet another sign, especially if he was uncertain how long he might run a “Variety Shop” in addition to a tavern.  After all, the devices on shop signs did not always directly correspond to the goods and services available in the shops they marked.  Residents of Boston knew that the Sign of the Heart and Crown adorned a printing office through experience, not because the image replicated the work undertaken there.  The Sign of the Stage Coach and Four and the Sign of the Man and Horse did correlate with “Victualling, Lodging & Boarding for Gentlemen and good Keeping for Horses,” but that did not preclude Wentworth from associating those images with other enterprises.   Rather than literal representations of the businesses they marked, shop signs often served as symbols meant to resonate with much more meaning.  They represented colonial entrepreneurs, their skills and reputations, not just the work they performed.

July 20

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Boston Evening-Post (July 20, 1772).

“Ebenezer Oliver Hereby informs the Publick and the Customers of his late Mother …”

In the summer of 1772, Ebenezer Oliver ran advertisements to advise “the Publick and the Customers of his late Mother Mrs. Bethiah Oliver, deceased,” that he had for sale a variety of goods “at the Shop formerly improved by her, nearly opposite the Old South Meeting-House, in Boston.”  The inventory included a “fine Assortment of China, Cream-colour’d, Glass, Delph, Flint and Stone WARE” as well as tea, sugar, coffee, and spices.

Ebenezer placed more emphasis on marketing those items than his mother had before her death.  Between 1765 and 1771, she placed advertisements in several newspapers each spring, joining the ranks of female seed sellers who sought customers among the residents of Boston.  Most of those women advertised seeds exclusively, even though they likely sold other items.  On occasion, Bethiah listed additional items at the end of an advertisement for “All Sorts of Garden Seeds,” such as a “general Assortment of Glass, Delph and Stone Ware, Lynn Shoes, best Bohea Tea, Coffee, Chocolate, and all other Groceries” in a notice in the April 14, 1766, edition of the Boston Evening-Post.  In contrast, Ebenezer placed an advertisement that did not mention seeds at all, but did provide an extensive list of groceries organized in two columns.

He did not, however, immediately transform the advertisements placed by his mother.  Bethiah died in the spring of 1771.  The following spring, her name appeared as a headline in advertisements for “GARDEN SEEDS Just imported by Captain Scott, from LONDON” in several newspapers, including the April 6, 1772, edition of the Boston-Gazette.  That advertisement included an extensive list of seeds, similar to the lists Bethiah published in recent years.  On closer examination, readers noted that the advertisement specified that the seeds were “to be Sold at the Shop formerly improved by Bethiah Oliver.”  Ebenezer replicated the marketing strategy that his mother had deployed mother in the late 1760s and early 1770s, probably hoping that name recognition and customer loyalty would draw friends and former customers to the shop that he now operated.

When Ebenezer expanded his marketing efforts beyond selling seeds in the spring, he initially invoked Bethiah’s name and “the Shop formerly improved by her” as a means of enticing “the Customers of his late Mother.”  As spring approached in 1773, nearly two years after his mother’s death, Ebenezer placed advertisements for “GARDEN SEEDS … just Imported in Capt. Jarvis from London” that deployed his name as a headline and referred to “his Shop,” though he added “(formerly improv’d by his late Mother Mrs. Bethiah Oliver, deceased.”  In the February 25, 1773, edition of the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter, he added a nota bene that alerted prospective customers that he also stocked “a fine Assortment of Cream-colour’d Ware, Glass, Delph, Flint and Stone Ware, with a general Assortment of Groceries.”  In so doing, he revived the format his mother formerly used but abandoned several years earlier when she decided that her notices in the public prints, like those of so many of her fellow female seed sellers, would focus exclusively on “GARDEN SEEDS.”

July 6

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

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

Boston Evening-Post (July 6, 1772).

“THE STAGE-COACH Between NEW-YORK and BOSTON.”

In the early 1770s, Jonathan Brown and Nicholas Brown placed advertisements seeking “encouragement” for stagecoach service they wished to establish between Boston and New York.  In addition to calling on the public to support them by traveling on their stagecoaches, the Browns sought investors “willing to become adventurers … in said undertaking.”  They outlined the various benefits of this service, including increasing commerce in the Connecticut as colonizers traveled through the province instead of bypassing it by sailing from New York to Providence and then continuing overland to Boston.

When summer arrived, the Browns launched the service on a trial basis.  They initially placed an advertisement in the June 25 edition of the New-York Journal to announce that the “STAGE COACH BETWEEN NEW-YORK AND BOSTON … for the first Time sets out this Day.”  In the following days, they placed additional advertisements in the Connecticut Courant, published in Hartford, and the Connecticut Journal, published in New Haven.  On July 6, their advertisement from the New-York Journal appeared in the Boston Evening-Post, alerting the public at that end of the line that the stagecoach paused in Hartford for a week and would arrive in Boston on July 11.  The Browns planned for the next trip to depart on July 11, so prospective passengers had nearly a week to make plans if they wished to travel at that time.  If demand warranted, the operators intended to “perform the Stage once a Week.”

The advertisement in the Boston Evening-Post included one element not included in the New-York Journal.  A woodcut depicting horses, a driver, and a stagecoach with a passenger visible inside appeared at the top of the advertisement.  That helped to draw attention to their notice by distinguishing it from others, especially since it was the only advertisement in that issue that incorporated an image (though Jolley Allen’s notice on the following page did feature his trademark border).

In hopes that their “Trial” would find sufficient “Encouragement” to establish a permanent route that ran once a week, the Browns placed advertisements in several newspapers along their route.  They did not, however, advertise as extensively as possible, perhaps due to budgetary constraints.  They could have flooded the market with advertising, placing notices in both newspapers printed in New York, all five in Boston, and even any in Philadelphia for prospective passengers who planned to travel north.  Perhaps they wished to assess the return on their investment for their initial round of advertising before expanding to additional publications.

June 29

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , ,

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

Boston Evening-Post (June 29, 1772).

“Not one single Article in the Store was bought of any Merchant in this Country.”

William Jackson regularly placed advertisements in several newspapers published in Boston in the late 1760s and early 1770s.  In addition to those notices, he distributed a trade card, engraved by Paul Revere, that depicted the “BRAZEN HEAD” that marked his location “next ye Town House.”  He eventually marketed his shop with another name, calling it “Jackson’s Variety Store” to call attention to the array of choices he made available to consumers.  In his newspaper notices and on his trade card, Jackson listed some of his merchandise.  In a notice in the June 29, 1772, edition of the Boston Evening-Post, for instance, he promoted a “full and compleat Assortment of English, India & Hard-Ware GOODS, consisting of Cloths of all Kinds, Linnens of all sorts, Calicoes, … Brass Kettles, London and Bristol Pewter, … an elegant Assortment of Looking-Glasses, Paper Hangings, [and] Wilton and Scotch Carpets.”

In a note at the end of that notice, Jackson assured “Wholesale and Retail Customers” that they “may depend that not one single Article in the Store was bought of any Merchant in this Country.”  Instead, he imported his wares directly “from the BEST Hands in ENGLAND, via LONDON, BRISTOL, and LIVERPOOL.”  That allowed him to sell his inventory “extremely Cheap” because he did not deal with middlemen on either side of the Atlantic.  Going to the manufacturers rather than through merchants meant that he could pass along savings to his customers rather than marking up goods as much as his competitors.  Jackson apparently considered this an effective marketing strategy.  A year earlier, he informed prospective customers that he “has been in England himself the last Winter, and has visited most of the manufacturing towns.”  As a result of that trip, Jackson “flatters himself that he has his Goods upon as good Terms as any Merchant in the Town.”  In a subsequent advertisement, he asserted, “Wholesale and retail Customers may depend upon having goods” at his store “as cheap as at any store or stop in town, without exceptions, as all his goods are from the best hands in England.”  If Jackson did not believe that this appeal resonated with consumers then he probably would not have published so many variations of it.  Many merchants and shopkeepers combined appeals about low prices and extensive choices.  Jackson devised a means of making those appeals distinctive.  He did not merely claim to offer low prices but also explained how he was able to do so.