| Contributor |
A. Gast & Co., printer. |
|
Major & Knapp Engraving, Manufacturing & Lithographic Co., printer. |
|
Phillips, Emily, 1822-1909, collector. |
| Title |
Dixon's carburet of iron stove polish. [graphic]. |
| Publisher |
New York : The Major & Knapp Lith. Co. 56 & 58 Park Pl |
| Publisher |
N.Y. New York. 1885 |
| Date |
[ca. 1885] |
| Physical Description |
3 prints : chromolithographs ; sheet 13 x 8 cm (5 x 3 in.) |
| Description |
Series of trade cards promoting Joseph Dixon Crucible Company's stove polish and depicting a racist caricature of an African
American woman nanny at work. Shows the nanny smiling, holding, and scrubbing an unclothed white girl, who is coated in black
stove polish along her right side. The long, brown haired girl wears a red headband and is partially covered by a white cloth
draped around by the nanny. The nanny uses a scrub brush under the right arm of the girl. The girl stands, her right leg raised,
upon a table covered with a yellow tablecloth and stained by the polish. She looks down and touches the nanny's face with
her right hand. She places her left hand over the woman's hand on her left side. The nanny is attired in a white head kerchief
with red polka dots; a yellow short-sleeved shirt with red stripes; and a blue skirt. On the table is a plate; a brush; and
boxes labeled Dixon's Stove Polish. Image also includes, in the left background, a stove with a steaming copper kettle and
a partial view of a stove pipe and checkered flooring. The Joseph Dixon Crucible Company, established by Joseph Dixon in Salem,
Mass. in 1827, produced graphite pencils, crucibles and stove polish, and relocated to Jersey City, N.J. in 1847. In 1868,
the firm name changed from Joseph Dixon & Co. to the Jos. Dixon Crucible Co. In 1870 the firm won a trademark case against
a Philadelphia competitor selling J.C. Dixon Stove Polish.
|
| Notes |
Title from item |
|
Printers and engravers include Major & Knapp Engraving, Manufacturing & Lithographic Co. (New York) and A. Gast & Co. (New
York and St. Louis).
|
|
Advertising text printed on verso: Advertising text printed on verso: Established 1827. Dixon's stove polish; over fifty years
in the market. Neat; quick; brilliant, and lasting. No dust. No odor. Nothing will make a stove so bright and cheerful for
so long a time as the Dixon stove polish. It is by far the cheapest in use, in the long run. Buy it. Try it. Take no other.
Pressed into a neat quarter-pound packet, absolutely free of adulteration. Six millions sold in 1880. Jos. Dixon Crucible
Co., Jersey City, N.J.
|
|
Gift of Emily Phillips, 1883. Purchase 1998. |
|
RVCDC |
|
Description revised 2021. |
|
Access points revised 2021. |
|
Cataloging funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (PW-506-19-10), 2010-2012. |
|
Digitized. |
| Subject |
Joseph Dixon Crucible Company. |
|
African American caregivers. |
|
African American women -- Caricatures and cartoons. |
|
Cleaning. |
|
Crucible industry -- New Jersey -- Jersey City. |
|
Girls. |
|
Kettles. |
|
Kitchens. |
|
Metallurgical industry -- New Jersey -- Jersey City. |
|
Metal polishes. |
|
Nannies (Children's nurses) |
|
Polishes industry -- New Jersey -- Jersey City. |
|
Racism in popular culture. |
|
Stoves. |
| Genre |
Chromolithographs -- 1880-1890. |
|
Trade cards -- 1880-1890. |
| Provenance |
Phillips, Emily, 1822-1909, collector. |
| Location |
Library Company of Philadelphia| Print Department| trade card - Dixon [1975.F.235; P.9577.14; P.9599] |
| Accession number |
1975.F.235 |
|
P.9577.14 |
|
P.9599 |
