The Hagley Vault

Selections from Hagley Museum and Library's archives and published collections on the history of American business, technology, and innovation.

April 21, 2025
Advertisement depicting a family and pets in silhouette, engaged in a chaotic chase after a rat

This week's visitor to the Hagley Vault is the E.S. Wells Medical Company, which produced this ca. 1890 advertising card for it's "Rough on Rats" pesticide. The New Jersey firm manufactured a strange combination of products: medicines for the general public, as well as rat poison.


The company's founder, Ephraim S. Wells (1841-1913) began his career apprenticing to a druggist in West Virginia before moving to New Jersey in 1862. There, he worked for a time in L.B. Bowie's Drug Store in Uniontown before purchasing two drugstores in Jersey City and, eventually, a manufacturing plant for his remedies. 

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Archive

For posts prior to October 2020, visit the Hagley Vault on Tumblr.

Monday, February 20, 2023
The most wanted man in America is making a visit to the Hagley Vault today ....
The most wanted man in America is making a visit to the Hagley Vault today. This ca. 1950 clip, starring Don Ameche, is from a larger film sponsored by the Cleveland-based Scott & Fetzer Company. The company was founded in the early 1920s to manufacture vacuum cleaners designed by local inventor James B. Kirby. By the time the company...
Glass negative showing six children arranged into a tower formation.
Friday, February 17, 2023
We present to you today, a tower of du Pont children ...
We present to you today, a tower of du Pont children. This glass plate negative shows a young Lammot du Pont II (1880-1952) with his sisters Sophie Madeleine (1871-1894), Isabella Mathieu (1882-1946), and Mary Alletta Belin (1878-1938), and with his cousins Alice Belin (1872-1944) and Mary Lammot (1869-1949). This image was created around 1884 on...
Fashion photograph of a woman in a pink and pastel nylon dress.
Thursday, February 16, 2023
On this date, February 16, in 1937, E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co. was granted U.S. patent ...
On this date, February 16, in 1937, E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co. was granted U.S. patent No. 2,071,250 for "monocomponent artificial filaments or the like of synthetic polymers". The synthetic fiber was invented by Dr. Wallace Carothers, a research chemist working for the company. The patent covered the formula and creation process for...
Yellow poster with a large red split heart in the center, with a man and woman's face on either side
Tuesday, February 14, 2023
We're saying "love" the modern way today with a Valentine's Day radiogram post ...
We're saying "love" the modern way today with a Valentine's Day radiogram post. This ca. 1947 poster was created by Japan’s Ministry of Telecommunications, and encouraged servicemen and other Americans in occupied Japan to send home radiogram greetings home for the holiday. This poster is part of the Hagley Library’s collection of Charles B....
Photograph of three women on a porch, ca. 1917.
Monday, February 13, 2023
Happy Galentine's Day, ladies!
Happy Galentine's Day, ladies! Today's photograph offers a quick glimpse into female companionship of years past. This undated photographic negative (ca. 1917?) shows the watercolorist and porcelain painter, Martha Culbertson Schoonover (1880-1965), and two other women. Martha's husband, and the likely photographer that captured this moment of...
Group photo of the Pennsylvania Railroad's 1926 football team, seated on wooden bleachers.
Thursday, February 9, 2023
We're doing our part to muster up some Super Bowl spirit ...
We're doing our part to muster up some Super Bowl spirit as we head into the weekend today. This negative photographic image of the Pennsylvania Railroad's apprentice boys football team was taken on October 11, 1926. The Altoona Works Apprentices were first organized around 1911. The year this photograph was taken, they were defending their title...
Advertisement featuring an illustration of a toddler with food and a glass of root beer. Text reads "Say, Mama, I want another glass of Hires Root Beer'.
Wednesday, February 8, 2023
This ca. 1892 advertisement for Hires root beer was produced by the Charles E. Hires Company ...
This ca. 1892 advertisement for Hires root beer was produced by the Charles E. Hires Company of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The company was founded by the pharmacist Charles Elmer Hires (1851-1937), who debuted his formula at the city's 1876 Centennial Exposition, making Hires Root Beer one of the oldest continuously produced soft drinks in the...
Four filmstrip style images showing different women shoplifting from a department store.
Monday, February 6, 2023
Busted! These images are part of a undated a group of photographs that the Strawbridge & Clothier department store once used ...
Busted! These images are part of a undated a group of photographs that the Strawbridge & Clothier department store once used to train employees on different shoplifting scenarios. They are now part of Hagley Library's collection of Strawbridge and Clothier photographs and audiovisual materials (Accession 1995.250). The collection documents the...
Posed portrait of a seated woman and two standing children, dressed in late 19th-century clothing.
Friday, February 3, 2023
This ca. 1888 glass plate negative, presumably a family portrait, is from Hagley Library’s collection ...
This undated (ca. 1888) glass plate negative, presumably a family portrait, is from Hagley Library’s collection of William Ferris II glass plate negatives (Accession 1974.359). William Ferris II (1822-1909) was, along with Philip Garrett (1814-1896), a senior partner in the firm of the Ferris & Garrett company, a supplier of plumbing fixtures...
Docked boat on a wooden bridge in a wetlands area of Beach Haven, New Jersey
Wednesday, February 1, 2023
This photographic negative of a docked boat was taken in Beach Haven, New Jersey ...
This photographic negative of a docked boat was taken in Beach Haven, New Jersey. The image is undated, but was possibly created roughly around the year 1915. It part of Hagley Library's collection of Frank E. Schoonover negatives (Accession 2017.239). Schoonover, a prolific commercial illustrator and artist, was also an avid photographer whose...
Illustrated border of cotton flowers surrounding a drawing of a woman's head and shoulders.
Monday, January 30, 2023
Can you keep a secret? Because I can't. So I'll tell you right now ...
Can you keep a secret? Because I can't. So I'll tell you right now - this illustration served as the cover for A Public Secret, a ca.1900 advertising pamphlet for Cottolene, a brand of shortening made by the N. K. Fairbanks Company. The product, made from beef suet and cottonseed oil, was manufactured from 1868 until the early 20th century. The...
Ad for children's activity books and games showing a little girl perusing a large rack of products.
Friday, January 27, 2023
It's all fun and games this Friday ....
It's all fun and games this Friday, thanks to this advertisement from the Whitman Publishing company of Racine, Wisconsin. After taking over the business of Chicago's Hamming-Whitman Publishing Company when it went bankrupt in 1915, Whitman found early success in the business of publishing low-cost children's books and games. This became...
This 1900 glass negative shows the Wilmington Friends School's football team in uniform ...
Wednesday, January 25, 2023
This 1900 glass negative shows the Wilmington Friends School's football team in uniform ...
This 1900 glass negative from Hagley Library’s collection of Thomas C. Marshall photographs (Acc. 1990.270) shows the Wilmington Friends School's football team in uniform. The Marshall family’s patriarch, Israel W. Marshall (1850-1911), founded the Marshall Brothers Paper Mill in Yorklyn in 1890. The wealth generated by this family business...
Cover for sheet music titled "Keep Away from the Fellow who owns an Automobile". Cover depicts a ca
Monday, January 23, 2023
We're starting the week off with a jaunty little warning for #MotorMonday enthusiasts ...
We're starting the week off with a jaunty little warning for #MotorMonday enthusiasts. This cover accompanied sheet music and lyrics written and composed by the composer, songwriter and lyricist Irving Berlin (1888-1989). It was published in 1912 by Waterson, Berlin & Snyder Co., a music publishing house founded by composer Ted Snyder (1881–...
Two long rows of tables covered in breakfast foods with diners and wait staff.
Friday, January 20, 2023
It's sometimes said that breakfast is the most important meal of the day ...
It's sometimes said that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, so we're starting our day with a breakfast hosted by the Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company on this date, January 20th, in 1920. The breakfast feast was held at Philadelphia's Broad Street Station for employees of the Engineering Department of the company's...
Posed portrait of two well-dressed women attending a ship launching. One is holding a ceremonial bottle and bouquet.
Wednesday, January 18, 2023
This photograph was taken on October 21, 1943 at the launching of the S.S. U.S.O., a Liberty Ship ...
This photograph was taken on October 21, 1943 at the launching of the S.S. U.S.O., a Liberty Ship built by the Bethlehem Ship Corporation. Liberty Ships were cargo ships, mass-produced by American manufacturers using simple, low-cost construction during World War II under the Emergency Shipbuilding Program. Between 1941 and 1945, the eighteen...

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