Raymond Loewy, Industrial Designer

Raymond Loewy (1893-1986), who said “Never leave well enough alone,” brought the idea and name “streamlined” to America. Loewy was born and educated as an engineer in Paris, and after World War I, he moved to the United States. He had a brief career as a fashion illustrator, and in 1923 he designed the trademark […]

Heinz

The H. J. Heinz Company traces its history back to 1869. Its first product was horseradish, but within a few years Heinz was selling ketchup, celery sauce, pickles, sauerkraut, and vinegar. The condiments were sold in tin cans, glass jars, and tin or stoneware crocks. The term 57 Varieties was chosen for its advertising effect, […]

Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola, a soft drink introduced at an Atlanta soda fountain in 1886, is one of the world’s best-known brand names. For more than a century, the company has been promoting the popular soft drink—and creating thousands of ads on bottles, trays, calendars, signs, toys, lamps, and other memorabilia that can be found in shops and […]

Carter’s Ink

Carter, Dinsmore and Company, founded in 1858 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, was named Carter’s Ink by 1898. The company made different types of ink bottles and labels that appeal to collectors. Ma and Pa Carter inkwells, a pair of ceramic figures with removable heads, were patented in 1914. Carter’s tall Ryto brand cathedral-shaped bottles of cobalt […]

Nipper, the Victor/RCA Dog

The trademark now known as Nipper was based on a painting by Francis Barraud that pictured his dog listening to a recording. Barraud added a Gramophone horn to the picture and sold it as an ad to the Gramophone Company of Bristol, England. The picture was titled His Master’s Voice. In 1906 Victor Talking Machine […]

Burma-Shave Highway Advertising

Remember Burma-Shave signs? These sets of small wooden signs advertising shaving cream first appeared by the side of the road in 1925. Each sign had one line of a humorous rhyme. They were placed about every one hundred feet or so. They disappeared about 1964. Mail Pouch tobacco used the painted barn as a huge […]

Buster Brown

Buster Brown and his dog, Tige, first appeared in Richard Felton Outcault’s cartoon strip in 1902. Outcault dreamed up the idea of licensing cartoon characters to merchants to promote products. He sold the right to use the Buster Brown name and figures as product trademarks to over fifty different companies. The Buster Brown Gang was […]

Store Collectibles: “Firsts”

Printed matchbook label: “Percussion Matches Manufactured by P. Truesdell, Warsaw, New York. Warranted New Yorker Print” was printed on the first matchbook label, which was made from 1855 to 1857. Cigarette cards: In 1885 Allen and Ginter of Richmond, Virginia, issued ten cigarettes in a box plus a picture card for five cents. These eventually […]

Aunt Jemima

The Pearl Milling Company first used the Aunt Jemima symbol on its ready-mixed pancake flour in 1889. Quaker Oats Company began using it in 1926. Aunt Jemima’s appearance changed through the years. A live Aunt Jemima appeared at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. She was played by a former slave, Nancy Green, a thin woman […]

The Apothecary Shop and Drug Store

The apothecary shop was the place to buy medicine in the years before the twentieth century. Bottles, cans, wooden boxes, and paper packets held the medicines. The owner dispensed the requested medicine, and there were no required prescriptions from doctors. The apothecary shop became a drug store by the end of the nineteenth century, and […]