Fishing Tackle

April 15

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

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

Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet (April 15, 1776).

“The patient fisher takes his silent stand, / Intent, his angle trembling in his hand.”

Edward Pole was no stranger to advertising.  He experimented with a variety of marketing strategies over the years.  Pole started out operating a “GROCERY STORE” in Philadelphia, but he also sold “FISHING TACKLE Of all sorts, for use of either sea or river.”  His advertisement in the Pennsylvania Chronicle in August 1772 gave nearly as much space to fishing tackle as to groceries.  In May 1774, he began adorning his advertisements in Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet with a woodcut depicting a fish, drawing attention to the portion of his notice that promoted fishing tackle.  In January 1775, Pole delivered the woodcut to the printing office of the Pennsylvania Ledger to accompany his advertisements in that newspaper.  In April 1776, the familiar image appeared in an advertisement in Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet once again.  This time, however, Pole did not mention groceries.  Instead, he devoted his entire advertisement to “FISHING TACKLE” and firearms.  Pole must have found that he could make a living by specializing in sporting goods.  In the 1780s, he distributed ornate trade cards that listed his occupation as “FISHING-TACKLE-MAKER.”

Even though Pole included his woodcut depicting a fish in his advertisement in the April 15, 1776, edition of Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet, it did not appear first.  Visual images usually appeared at the top of newspaper advertisements, but Pole instead chose to open his notice with several lines of poetry from Alexander Pope’s “Windsor-Forest” (1713).

IN genial Spring, beneath the quiv’ring shade,
Where cooling vapours breathe along the mead,
The patient fisher takes his silent stand,
Intent, his angle trembling in his hand;
With looks unmov’d, he hopes the scaly breed,
And eyes the dancing cork and bending reed.
Our plenteous streams a various race suppy:
The bright ey’d PEARCH, with fins of TYRIAN dye;
The silver EEL, in shing volumes roll’d;
The yellow CARP, in scales bedrop’d with gold;
Swift TROUTS, diversify’d with crimson stains,
And PIKE, the tyrants of wat’ry plains.  POPE.

As spring arrived and some consumers contemplated spending leisure time fishing, Pole deployed the poem to invite them to imagine themselves spending time outside, next to a river.  To make the most of that time, they could treat themselves to new fishing equipment, including a “dancing cork” (or bobber) and a “bending reed” (or pole).  Pole was prepared to supply “Gentlemen going on parties in the FISHING way, either to the river, capes, or Black Point,” with “the best kind of FISHING TACKLE suitable for those places.”  Via the lines from “Windsore-Forest,” he prompted them to envision the different fish they might catch or simply the pleasure they would derive from their pastime and the company they would keep, whether their own quiet contemplation or fellowship with other members of their party.  Including the poem increased the length of his advertisement and thus the cost of running of it, but Pole apparently considered it worth the investment to engage prospective customers and make his marketing more memorable.

January 28

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

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

Pennsylvania Ledger (January 28, 1775).

“POULSON’s AMERICAN INK-POWDER.”

Just four days after Benjamin Towne launched the Pennsylvania Evening Post, James Humphreys, Jr., commenced publication of the Pennsylvania Ledger on January 28, 1775.  In less than a week, the number of English-language newspapers printed in Philadelphia increased from three to five, rivaling the number that came off the presses in Boston.  No other city in the colonies had as many newspapers.  Humphreys incorporated the colophon into the masthead, advising that he ran his printing office “in Front-street, at the Corner of Black-horse Alley:– Where Essays, Articles of News, Advertisements, &c. are gratefully received and impartially inserted.”

Unlike the first issue of the Pennsylvania Evening Post, the inaugural edition of the Pennsylvania Ledger carried advertisements.  Humphreys placed some of them, one hawking “POLITICAL PAMPHLETS … on Both Sides of the Question,” another promoting an assortment of books he sold, and a final one seeking “an APPRENTICE to the Printing Business.”  Nine other advertisers placed notices, all of them for consumer goods and services.  They took a chance that the new newspaper had sufficient circulation to merit their investment in advertising in its pages.

Among those advertisers, Zachariah Poulson marketed “POULSON’s AMERICAN INK-POWDER.”  He asserted that “most of the Printers, Bookseller, and Stationers, in Philadelphia” stocked that product.  Customers just needed to request it.  With the deteriorating political situation in mind, especially the boycott of imported goods outlined in the Continental Association, Poulson called on “all Lovers of American Manufacture” in Pennsylvania and “in the neighbouring provinces and colonies” to choose his ink powder over any other.

Detail from Edward Pole’s Advertisement in the Pennsylvania Ledger (January 28, 1775).

Edward Pole inserted the lengthiest advertisement (except for Humphreys’s notice cataloging the books he sold).  It filled half a column, the first portion devoted to the merchandise available “at his GROCERY STORE, in Market-street” and the rest to “FISHING TACKLE of all sorts,” “FISHING RODS of various sorts and sizes,” and other fishing equipment.  In advertisements in several newspapers published in Philadelphia (and, later, with ornate trade cards that he distributed), Pole regularly marketed himself as a sporting goods retailer.  For the first issue of the Pennsylvania Ledger, he adorned his advertisement with a woodcut depicting a fish that previously appeared in his notices in Dunlap’s Pennsylvania Packet in May and June 1774.

Humphreys provided residents of Philadelphia and other towns greater access to news and editorials with the Pennsylvania Ledger, but that was not all.  The publication of yet another newspaper in Philadelphia increased the circulation of advertising in the city and region, disseminating messages to consumers far and wide.  Not long after Humphreys published that first issue, advertisers took to the pages of the Pennsylvania Ledger to publish notices for a variety of purposes, supplementing the information the editor selected for inclusion.

August 29

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , ,

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

Pennsylvania Chronicle (August 29, 1772).

“FISHING TACKLE.”

In the summer of 1772, Edward Pole advertised a variety of items available at his ‘GROCERY STORE” on Second Street in Philadelphia.  He stocked everything from wines and spirits to “Green, Bohea, Hyson and Soushong Teas” to raisins and currants to “mustard by the bottle or pound.”  Pole declared that he would “make it his chief study to merit” repeat business from his customers “by keeping an assortment of the best kind of GROCERIES, and selling them on the lowest terms.”

Yet Pole stocked more than just groceries.  His advertisement in the August 29 edition of the Pennsylvania Chronicle included a headline and a section for “FISHING TACKLE” available at his store.  He carried “Fishing rods of various kinds, best Kerby and common hooks of all sizes, artificial flies, wheels, silk, hair and trolling lines of every kind, length, and goodness, deapseas, casting, minnow and scoop nets,” and other items.  He made a point of promoting “the best kind of fish-hooks, made by ROBERT CARTER, fish-hook maker, from Trenton.”

Over time, the appropriately-named Pole placed greater emphasis on marketing fishing supplies.  By 1781, he was placing advertisements for “Fishing Tackle Of all sorts, for Use of either SEA or RIVER, MADE AND SOLD By Edward Pole” in the Pennsylvania Packet.  A woodcut depicting a fish adorned those advertisements.  He commissioned another woodcut of a fish, this one with a decorative border, for his advertisement in the March 24, 1784, edition of the Freeman’s Journal.  At about the same time, he made an even greater investment in a trade card engraved by David Tew.  A vignette showed two gentlemen fishing, one with a rod and the other with a net.  The gentleman with the rod had a fish on the line, its head sticking out of the water, while the gentleman with the net attempted to scoop up the fish.  An ornate cartouche, complete with fishing lures dangling from it, served as border for the text of this advertisement.  The trade card announced that “Edward Pole FISHING-TACKLE-MAKER … es & Sells all kinds of the best Fishing Tackle for the use of either Sea or River.”  A nota bene advised, “Gentlemen going on parties, in the Fishing Way Compleatly fitted out on the shortest notice.”

The headline for “FISHING TACKLE” in Pole’s newspaper advertisements published in 1772 foreshadowed the more extensive marketing efforts he launched in the 1780s.  He further enhanced newspaper notices with visual images as he increasingly specialized in fishing supplies.  He also distributed an engraved trade card that featured images that rivaled any on the hundreds of trade cards distributed in London in the eighteenth century, making his business all the more memorable to the gentlemen he aimed to serve.

Edward Pole, Trade Card, engraved by David Tew (Philadelphia, 1780s). Courtesy Historical Society of Pennsylvania.