John White

February 27

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

Massachusetts Spy (February 27, 1774).

“GARDEN SEEDS … SOLD by SUSANNA RENKEN.”

Susanna Renken was not the first entrepreneur to advertise seeds in Boston’s newspapers as the spring of 1774 approached, though she had been on several occasions in the past decade.  That distinction went to John White, “Gardner, and Seeds-Man, in SEVEN-STAR LANE,” with his advertisement in the February 17 edition of the Massachusetts Spy, yet within a week Renken she activated her advertising campaign.  Fittingly, Renken placed an advertisement for “GARDEN SEEDS” in the next issue, serving as a counterpoint to White’s repeated notice.

Unlike the approach White had taken so far, Renken did not confine her marketing efforts to a single newspaper.  When she ran her first advertisement on February 24, she placed it in both the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter and the Massachusetts Spy.  That made her among the first of the sorority of female seed sellers to advertise in 1774.  Her competitors Elizabeth Clark and Elizabeth Nowell also ran a notice in the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter.  It appeared immediately to the left of Renken’s advertisement.

So began the annual contest to woo customers to purchase seeds.  As had been her practice in the past, Renken continued expanding her advertising campaign, seeking to reach more prospective customers by inserting her notice in multiple newspapers.  On February 28, she ran it in the Boston Evening-Post, immediately above Elizabeth Greenleaf’s advertisement for “GARDEN-SEEDS.”  The appropriately named Greenleaf was part of the sisterhood of seed sellers who advertised extensively each spring.  On the same day, her advertisement appeared immediately above Renken’s advertisement in the Boston-Gazette.  Perhaps having noticed that Renken and Clark and Nowell commenced their advertising Greenleaf determined that it was time to invest in her own marketing efforts for 1774.

For whatever reason, none of them or their competitors placed advertisements in the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Post-Boy on February 28, but the March 3 edition of the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter once again featured advertisements from Renken and Clark and Nowell, joined by Greenleaf.  As had been common in previous years, the compositor arranged them one after the other in a single column.  Printers did not usually arrange advertisements by purpose or category, but they often made an exception for women who sold seeds in Boston.  Renken and White once again placed their notices in the Massachusetts Spy on March 3.

For newspaper readers in and near Boston, this flurry of advertising was an annual ritual.  It signaled that spring was on its way.  Perhaps for modern readers who regularly visit the Adverts 250 Project, these advertisements serve a similar purpose, a sign of the changing seasons as days become longer even if not necessarily warmer.

February 17

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

Massachusetts Spy (February 17, 1774).

“GARDEN SEEDS.”

It was a sign of the changing seasons for colonizers in Boston.  Each year several female entrepreneurs who sold seeds took to the pages of the several newspapers published in the urban port.  Among them, Lydia Dyar, Elizabeth Greenleaf, and Susanna Renken usually began running notices by the end of February, alerting readers that they sold a variety of seeds.  Renken had been the first to do so in 1768, 1770, and 1773.  On occasion, men joined the women, including John Adams and Ebenezer Oliver, who took up the trade following the death of his mother, Bethiah Oliver.

Renken was not the first to advertise seeds and announce that spring was on its way in 1774.  Instead, that distinction went to John White, “Gardner, and Seeds-Man, in SEVEN-STAR LANE.”  White first advertised in the Massachusetts Spy on February 3 and then again on February 10 and 17.  No other seed sellers, male or female, joined the chorus in the Massachusetts Spy or any of the other newspapers in Boston in that time, not even Renken.  For a few weeks, White was alone in hawking a “large assortment of GARDEN SEEDS” imported from London and an “assortment of AMERICAN SEEDS.”

His female competitors tended to run their advertisements in multiple newspapers, but White confined his initial efforts to the Massachusetts Spy.  He did, however, experiment with a format that differed from the dense paragraphs that listed all sorts of seeds that Renken and her sorority of seed sellers usually inserted in the public prints.  White organized his advertisement as a catalog, dividing it into two columns.  In each column, he included only one type of seed per line and the price for either a bushel or a pound.  That likely made it easier for prospective customers to peruse his notice and spot items of interest.  In addition, Renken and others did not usually include their prices.  White’s method allowed readers to spot bargains without needing to visit his shop.

White was the first to herald the arrival of spring in 1774, making his notices memorable with a format that differed from what Dyar, Greenleaf, Renken, and others published in previous years.  He may have hoped that a head start and providing prices in his advertisement would give him an edge in what would become a very competitive market in the coming months.

September 19

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

Pennsylvania Chronicle (September 19, 1772).

“John White Stay-Maker”

Most advertisements in colonial newspapers did not feature visual images.  Those that did usually used a stock image provided by the printer, such as a ship at sea, a house, a horse, or an enslaved person liberating him- or herself by “running away.”  Never elaborate in the scenes depicted, such woodcuts could be used interchangeably in advertisements from the appropriate genre.  Some advertisers, however, commissioned images that corresponded to the shop signs that marked their locations or illustrated one or more items available among their merchandise.

Two such images appeared in the September 19, 1772, edition of the Pennsylvania Chronicle.  Robert Parrish once again included the woodcut depicting a “ROLLING SCREEN for cleaning wheat and flaxseed,” though he did not use a woodcut showing a Dutch fan or winnowing fan that previously appeared with it.  Perhaps he did not wish to incur the additional cost for the space required to publish two images.

Another entrepreneur, John White, adorned his advertisement with an image of a stay (or corset), the body and holes for the laces on the left and the laces on the right.  Readers would have easily recognized the garment and understood how it wrapped around and confined a woman’s body.  The words “John White” and “Stay-Maker” flanked the woodcut.  The image accounted for half of the space for the advertisement, an additional investment beyond commissioning the woodcut.

White announced that he moved to a new location where “he continues to carry on the Staymaking business as usual.”  He pledged “to give satisfaction to all who are pleased to employ him.”  He also solicited “orders from any part of the country” and provided mail order service, making it unnecessary for clients to visit his shop in Philadelphia.  Instead, they could send measurements “in respect to length and width of the Stays, both at top and bottom exactly, in the front and back parts.”  The staymaker warned that customers who opted for that convenience needed to pay postage for such orders rather than expect him to take responsibility for those charges.

The woodcut depicting a stay, its body and laces unfurled, almost certainly helped attract attention to White’s advertisement, his promises of customer satisfaction, and the option for submitting orders “by the post” rather than visiting his shop.  Most newspaper advertisements consisted solely of text, so any sort of visual enhancement, whether an image or decorative type, distinguished those advertisements from others.

October 1

Carl Robert Keyes Daily Advert Update , , , , ,

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

Oct 1 - 10:1:1768 Providence Gazette
Providence Gazette (October 1, 1768).

“The Establishment of Manufactories is essentially necessary to the Well-being of the British Colonies.”

Resistance to the Townshend Act played out in newspaper advertisements for consumer goods published in the fall of 1768. Two types of boycotts – nonimportation agreements and nonconsumption agreements – were among the most effective means of resistance adopted by colonists during the imperial crisis that preceded the American Revolution. Colonists sought to leverage their economic power to achieve political goals. As Americans throughout the colonies prepared to participate in a new nonimportation agreement set to go into effect on January 1, 1769, John White, a “Tallowchandler and Soapboiler, from London,” joined an increasingly familiar refrain of artisans who promoted goods produced in the colonies.

White placed an advertisement in Providence Gazette to inform readers in “Town and Country” that he had “set up a Manufactory … in the main Street of the Town of Providence.” The tallow chandler and soap boiler devoted a significant portion of his advertisement to advancing an appeal that resonated with contemporary discussions about politics and the relationship between Parliament and colonies. “At a Time when the Establishment of Manufactories is essentially necessary to the Well-being of the British Colonies,” White proclaimed, “it is hoped and expected that a suitable Encouragement will not be found wanting in a people, who, upon all Occasions, have manifested a high Regard to the true Interests of their Country.” He did not merely announce the availability of locally produced soap and candles; he framed purchasing those items as the civic responsibility of colonists, a means of demonstrating that they indeed “manifested a high Regard to the true Interests of their Country.” Lest any should suspect that they might do so at the expense of acquiring quality goods, White offered assurances that his soap and candles were “wrought as well as they are done in London, or any Part of Europe.” Prospective customers did not need to fear sacrificing quality when they made consumer choices inspired by political ideals.

Individual colonists ultimately made their own decisions about their consumption habits during the imperial crisis. However, several constituencies attempted to persuade, cajole, shame, and sometimes even bully colonists into observing boycotts of imported goods. Friends and neighbors encouraged and watched each other, especially as the Sons of Liberty, colonial legislators, and other political leaders gained greater visibility in promoting nonimportation agreements. Coverage of their activities often appeared among the news items in colonial newspapers. Yet elsewhere in those same newspapers artisans and others who sold locally made goods placed advertisements that joined in the chorus, launching their own appeals in support of domestic manufactures in hopes of shaping consumer demand in the colonies.