Album page containing a drawing of coupled red and blue flowers above six lines of allegorical verse about unappreciated beauty. Shows the red camellia with fluffy stamens below three, five-petal blue flowers, possibly forget-me-nots. The flowers are also depicted with buds, leaves, and stems. The stem of the red flower contains thorns., Title from manuscript verse., Date inferred from complementary entries in album., Contains six lines of verse: No marvel woman should love flowers, they bear/ So much of fanciful similitude/ To her own history; like herself repaying/ With such sweet interest all the cherishing/ That calls their beauty or their sweetness forth;/ And like her too—dying beneath neglect. Verse from a poem by English writer Letitia Elizabeth Landon that was frequently published, including in the Ladies’ Miscellany (Salem, Mass., April 7, 1830)., RVCDC, Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022., Douglass, was an artist, prominent Quaker member of the Philadelphia African American elite community, educator, and anti-slavery activist.
Creator
Douglass, S. M. (Sarah Mapps), 1806-1882, artist
Date
[ca. 1833]
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Amy Matilda Cassey album [P.9764.24]
A worker wearing a hat and apron hold a piece fo cloth on a stick above a dyeing vat. The sender rejects the recipient because of his lowly occupation., Text: Your person reminds me of some ugly Cub / Therefore I advise you to stick to your tub/ If by Dying you live pray sir don’t die for me, / For my heart’s not engaged yet nor likely to be., Provenance: Helfand, William H..
A man with simian features kneels in the grass and smokes a cigar., Text: Here your portrait you may see, / Drawn as like as like can be, / Your features coarse, your frightful shape, / You may behold, you ugly ape! / A glance from you, you horrid churl, / The life would frighten from any girl., Provenance: Helfand, William H..
A woman with a hairy face and gap-toothed smile looks at her reflection in a mirror. The sender's parise is ironic., Text: Oh! Thou art my joy and my pride, / So delicate soft is thy skin: / Those blushes, my fair, never hide, / For fain I’d my Valentine win., Provenance: Helfand, William H..
A cook wearing a bonnet holds a pot on a stove. She has a long pointed nose. The Valentine suggests she is too ugly to find love., Text: Goddess of the fries and stews, / To court the male sex ‘tis no use; / Your nose I’m sure is only fit / To make a kitchen roasting spit; / Then cut your foolish ways, pray do, / I’ll ne’er have a Valentine like you., Signed: Pickering., Provenance: Helfand, William H..
A girl stands with her hands on her hips. Her face is covered in bandages. The valentine suggests the injuries might be self-inflicted., Text: Pray tell me, miss, how came you by them? / Are they cuts or scratches? / Or are they beauty-spots—good gracious! / All those awful patches?, "392", Provenance: Helfand, William H..
A young woman in a gown holds a bouquet of flowers., Text: Thou languishing young lady bird, / Thou angel quite untainted, / With ruby lips and well formed hips, / Pray tell me – are you painted! / You’re uglier than the Gorgon, / That hightoned folks to stone, / I little thought my darling, / Such a beauty you’d have grown., Provenance: Helfand, William H..
A woman wearing bloomers rides a bicycle. She has a wide grin and several missing teeth. The valentine mocks her good humor and compares her to monkeys and donkeys and plays on the word "asinine.", Text: Oh, dear, what a sweet little creature! / Who can deny that you shine? / There’s not face in the cage of the monkeys, / At the Zoo, can compare with thine; / And so bright you are! And so witty! / To list’ to your merry “tee-hee,”/ Makes one think of some happy young donkey / Indulging in asinine glee., Provenance: Helfand, William H..
A coachmen wearing a top hat opens the door of a carriage., Text: When I’m stuck behind the Carriage, / With my cockade on my hat, / The servant maids, I hear them / Say, a nice young man is that., Provenance: Helfand, William H..
A woman with a long nose holds a bonnet. Other millinery articles sit on a table behind her and a piar of scissors hangs from her waist., Text: Ugliest of the fair creation, / With lips that are not red but blue; / And face devoid of animation, / Take me for your lover true., Provenance: Helfand, William H..
A woman with a grotesquely large nose holds a baby and is accompanied by a small boy. The text suggests that since her large nose and head repel any possible suitors, she must content herself with caring for these children., Text: You looking for a Valentine, whoever would suppose, / You'd ever get a Valentine with such a head and nose, / You'd best stick to the nursery, and the children dandle, / Such a head and nose serves well for a handle; / You've got two kids already, therefore contented be, / I assure you for a Valentine you never will kid me., Provenance: McAllister, John A. (John Allister), 1822-1896, collector.
A woman with exaggeratedly large lips sits with a screaming child on her knee. Both she and the child wear large feathered hats., Text: You nasty, drunken, stupid cat, / Likewise your frightful squalling brat, / Are both so ugly that 'tis vain / Your various features to explain! / Your lips are nothing else but good 'uns, / Exactly like two large black puddings; / Nature, you've no cause to thank it / For eyes like burnt holes in a blanket; / In short, devoid of bow or feather, / You are a beauty all together., Provenance: McAllister, John A. (John Allister), 1822-1896, collector.
Envelope illustrated with a central image showing a fashionable woman, her long hair loose, and over her shoulder. Also contains a border comprised of floral imagery. Susan Allen, wife of a New York dentist, marketed her restorer starting in the 1840s. She sold her business to Selah R. Van Duzer circa 1862., Text printed on verso: A Real Hair Restorer and Dressing in One Bottle. Mrs. S. A. Allen's Improved New Style Hair Restorer. Price one dollar. Buy a Bottle of Mrs. Allen's Hair Restorer and receive a Perfumed Sachet free. Perfumed Sachet. Place this unopened in Drawer or Trunk, the Odor is delicious. Its remarkable success is due to the superiority and freshness of its ingredients, and the scrupulous care bestowed in its manufacture; also for its prompt, quick action, great growth, life, and vigor that it is sure to give to the hair-never failing by a few applications, to restore Gray or White Hair to its Natural Color. Ladies will find it a standard toilet luxury to dress their hair. Sold by all druggists. Principal Sales Offices, 198 and 200 Greenwich Street, New York, and 266 High Holborn, London, England., Cataloging funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (PW-506-19-10), 2010-2012., Gift of William H. Helfand.
Date
[ca. 1870]
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Helfand Popular Medicine Ephemera Collection - Bags and envelopes [P.2010.37.94]
Real estate photograph commissioned by Albert M. Greenfield & Company depicting Silverman's Pawn Shop and Old Reliable Clothing House for sale. Clothing, jewelry, and musical instruments are prominently displayed in the store windows. Image includes adjacent buildings at 1906 and 1910 South Street of an African American "Hair Shop of Mme. V.V. Maginley," and an abandoned Army & Navy store. The hair shop displays several beauty products and Black dolls. Posters for the "101 Ranch Wild West Street Parade" hang in the windows of the abandoned store. Also visible in the right is a man pedestrian (out of focus and ghost-like). The real estate firm was established in 1905. The Greenfield Bulletin contained photographic illustrations, property listings, and articles about the firm's important brokerage and development deals., Title from manuscript note on verso., Date based on content and active dates of the photographer., Photographer's imprint inscribed on negative., Negative inscribed: 606 D2., Stamped on verso: Greenfield Bulletin, Issue June. Page 4. No. 4., Purchase 2000., Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022., Part of digital collections catalog through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education through the Office of Commonwealth Libraries, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, Governor, 2013-2014., Rau Studios, established in Philadelphia in 1887 by William Herman Rau, was a respected commercial firm which operated until around the early 1930s.
Creator
Rau Studios, photographer
Date
[ca. 1927]
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Photographs-Greenfield Collection [P.9789.13]
Real estate photograph commissioned by the Jackson-Cross Company depicting an ornate four story commercial front at 1010 Chestnut Street, occupied by Alexander's clothing shop on the ground level, Sun Beam Beauty Shops on the second floor and Merin Studios on the third floor. Charles David's clothing store occupies the ground floor of 1008 Chestnut Street and Fur Outlet Co., furriers, occupies the ground floor of the building at 1012 Chestnut Street. The property at 1010 Chestnut Street was altered in 1891 for Queen & Co. after designs by the architectural firm of Baily & Truscott. David B. Bassett altered the basement for Shaw Walker in 1919., Label on recto: Jackson-Cross Company., Title from manuscript note on verso., The Jackson-Cross Company, established around 1876, was a Philadelphia real estate firm in operation until 1998.
Date
ca. 1940
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Jackson-Cross [P.9784.27]
Printed area, including double-rule border, measures 64.3 x 21.7 cm., Originally part of a McAllister scrapbook., Digitized by Alexander Street Press for Images of the American Civil War.
Creator
Woodroffe's Original Bohemian Troupe of Glass Blowers
Date
[1863]
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare *PB 1863 Woodroffe (6)5761.F.11a (McAllister)
Real estate photograph commissioned by the Jackson-Cross Company depicting a three story brick building, occupied by various shops and offices, looking west at the northwest corner of Seventeenth and Sansom Streets. Signs for a barber shop, Magic cleaners and beauty shop are visible in the ground floor windows. Several pedestrians pass by on the sidewalk and a Railway Express truck is parked curbside. An unidentified brick high-rise is visible in the background., Label on recto: Jackson-Cross Company, Lincoln-Liberty Building, Philadelphia., Title from manuscript note on recto., The Jackson-Cross Company, established around 1876, was a Philadelphia real estate firm in operation until 1998.
Date
ca. 1940
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Jackson-Cross [P.9784.14]
Full-length portrait of an African American woman caretaker standing on the steps with a white girl and a white boy. The woman, wearing her hair tied up and attired in a hat and a long-sleeved, white dress with a belt, stands on the sidewalk before the stairs with her right hand in front of her waist and her left hand behind her back. The girl, wearing her curly hair with a bow tied in the left and attired in a long-sleeved white dress with a belt, white socks, and Mary Jane shoes, stands on the steps facing the viewer with her hands at her side. In the right, the boy, attired in a sailor suit with a belt and shoes, stands facing the viewer with his hands at his sides. In the left is "The Criterion," a hair dressing parlor in Atlantic City. The parlor operated from 1907 until 1908, first at the Hotel Islesworth, then The Hotel Bothwell., Title supplied by cataloger., Date inferred from the attire of the sitters., Accessioned 1998., RVCDC, Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022., Part of digital collections catalog through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education through the Office of Commonwealth Libraries, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, Governor, 2013-2014.
Date
[ca. 1907]
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department photos - 5 x 7 - unidentified - Recreation [P.9619.3]
