Wear Celluloid Collars and Cuffs (ca.1870)

Nov 7, 2013



A charming set of 19th Century American trade cards, advertising - via the medium of a frog and gnome-like character - collars and cuffs made of a waterproof linen (celluloid). After the Civil War there was a huge boom in advertising throughout the United States. The new widespread network of railroads which covered the land enabled the mass production of industrial and consumer goods on a scale never seen before and with this rise in goods came also a need to rise above the competition via eye-catching adverts. Advertising spread to a huge variety of media, including catalogues, broadsides, newspapers and sets of advertising cards like those featured here, miniature posters, about the size of a postcard, which were handed out as souvenirs at major expositions.