The Hagley Vault

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

Archive

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

Black and white photo of a large group of men and women with office equipment and paperwork.
Wednesday is is Tax Day, so we've invited some special guests to the Hagley Vault ....
Wednesday is is Tax Day, so we've invited some special guests to the Hagley Vault this week to give us a hand. This 1955 photograph shows the 61 men and women chosen to represent the DuPont company's Tax, Legal, Payroll, Tabulating, Statistical, and General Ledger Departments, as well as the paperwork and office equipment used to manage the…
An illustration depicts the Wonder Bakery building at the Chicago World's Fair, with a crowd of people, "Wonder Bakery" signage, and three balloons advertising "Wonder Bread".
This week's Hagley Vault post is a real (sugar) rush ...
This week's Hagley Vault post is a real (sugar) rush, as it's in recognition of the invention of Hostess Twinkies snack cakes, created on April 6, 1930 by James A. Dewar, plant manager at Continental Baking Company, in Chicago, Illinois.  Dewar created the confection while looking for an inexpensive product to meet the economic needs of…
Black and white photograph of two children in Easter costumes with baskets.
Everything is just fine and candy this week as we hop along to the Easter holiday.
Everything is just fine and candy this week as we hop along to the Easter holiday. The two peeps in a pod joining us for an Easter egg hunt in this ca. 1932 photograph are Junius and Paulina Dean, the children of Junius Simpson Dean (1896-1978) and Paulina du Pont Dean (1903-1964). Paulina was the niece of Pierre Samuel "P.S." du Pont (1870-1954…
Page from a flower catalog featuring colorful images of daffodils.
Hello, Spring!
Hello, Spring! It may be off to a chilly start, but spring is here and blooms are sure to follow. We're getting the jump on those early spring flowers this week with a page from the Henry F. Michell Company's Fall 1945 catalog. The still-operating and still family-owned horticultural business was founded in Philadelphia in 1890 by Swedish…
Front cover of booklet. Dark blue, gold text reads 'Buildings that Serve' and 'Sun Oil Co.'
Yaass, duplex! We're going to werk this week ...
Yaass, duplex! We're going to werk this week with some buildings that serve, honey. Or serve gasoline, anyway. This ca. 1940 pamphlet from the Sun Oil Company is a guide to service station construction, intended to walk its dealers through the basics of the exterior and interior of 'Suntype' gasoline and automobile service station construction and…
Catalogue cover for Gordon Novelty Co. featuring illustrations of people using products.
Whoopee! It's a 1957 catalog for the Gordon Novelty Company!
Whoopee! It's a 1957 catalog for the Gordon Novelty Company! This New York City wholesaler of costumes, party supplies, gag gifts, puzzles, novelty toys, carnival items was once a star (and final holdout) of the city's Novelty District.   The company was founded around 1928 by Jacob "Jack" Gordon (c.1905-?), a Jewish emigrant whose family…
Colorful motivational poster about acknowledging mistakes featuring a tiger about to spring.
The weekend forecast for the grounds of Hagley Museum and Library is looking ready to spring ..
The weekend forecast for the grounds of Hagley Museum and Library is looking ready to spring for Spring, and we are feeling so fine about it we're bringing you a feline this week in the Hagley Vault. This ca. 1929 poster from our Mather & Company workplace posters (Accession 1994.319) collection was produced by Mather & Company, a…
Black and white photograph of a mannequin in a woman's swim suit.
The Hagley Vault has a special guest star this week ...
The Hagley Vault has a special guest star this week. Miss Patience, seen here in a ca. 1936 photograph was one of NBC's first regularly filmed stars of studio 3H.  During these early years of television, film cameras required intense light to capture images for broadcast. So much so that NBC's Betty Goodwin, television's first female…
Black and white photograph of men loading a large computer component onto a hoist for a crane.
Here's something to be grateful for next time you upgrade your home office ...
Here's something to be grateful for next time you upgrade your home office; you no longer need heavy machinery to accomplish the job. This undated photograph from around the 1950s shows workers delivering an early computer to the Marine Trust Company building in Buffalo, New York. It comes from a partially digitized folder of 8 photographic prints…
Black and white image of three women at a demonstration telephone call application desk.
By 1930, almost 41% of American housing units featured a telephone ....
By 1930, almost 41% of American housing units featured a telephone. But the Depression undid many of these gains. By 1933, more than 2.5 million households had cancelled their service and fewer than a third of American homes were reachable by phone. Which perhaps explains why corporations like American Telephone & Telegraph (AT&T) and…
Reflecting pool bordered by colorful flowerbeds, with trees in the background,
We're offering a break from the snow and winter weather this week ...
We're offering a break from the snow and winter weather this week and sharing a glass lantern slide image of the gardens bordering a spillway pond at the Hill Girt farm of Harry and Elizabeth Haskell in Chadd's Ford, Pennsylvania. The photograph was taken by William C. Spruance on June 30, 1923. It's distinctive coloration is the result of the…
Four women compete in a snow shoveling contest to promote the 1967 International Ski and Winter Sports Show in New York, New York. The two women using Teflon-S coated shovels win the contest.
Hagley Library will be closed this Monday, so we can shovel out from under the snow and ice ...
Hagley Library will be closed this Monday, so we can shovel out from under the snow and ice like everyone else in the region.  If any of you need any inspiration to get your own sidewalks cleared, here's a DuPont sponsored women's snow-shoveling contest, created to promote the company's Teflon-S fluoropolymer, used here to coat snow-shovels.…
Intro to a magic-themed sponsored film about canned pears
On this day in 1825, the United States Patent and Trademark Office issued its first patent for a system to "preserve animal substances in tin" ...
On this day in 1825, the United States Patent and Trademark Office issued its first patent for a system to "preserve animal substances in tin". Ezra Dagget and his nephew Thomas Kensett, the patent holders, had been canning salmon, oysters and lobsters out of their seafood processing factory in New York City since 1819.  Tin cans had been put…
Advertisement using a comic strip format to promote a bread brand and the benefits of cellophane wrapping.
Usually we wouldn't recommend ....
Usually we wouldn't recommend just casually searching the internet at work for things like "wife discovers the spice of life". But, as it turns out, it's just bread and cellophane. This undated advertisement from DuPont promoted the company's cellophane. DuPont acquired U.S. patent rights in cellophane in 1923, but it was soon revealed that water…
Black and white photograph of a woman in a laboratory measuring another woman's hip area with a contour meter apparatus.
If you're feeling grateful for stretchy waistbands after the holidays ...
If you're feeling grateful for stretchy waistbands after the holidays, you have Dr. Joseph Shivers (1920-2014) to thank. Shivers began working for DuPont in 1946 as a researcher assigned to improving polymers. He was soon tasked with a new project; DuPont's market research on what women consumers wanted from textile fabrics had spurred research…
Cover for The Sohioan's January 1939 issue, showing an illustration of a baby under a spotlight.
So long, 2025!
So long, 2025! The clock doesn't strike midnight every day, so we're celebrating this special occasion with a January 1939 issue of The Sohioan, a magazine published by the Standard Oil Company (Ohio) for its subsidiaries' and divisions' current and former employees, as well as dealers, distributors, and stockholders.  Standard Oil Company (…