Overview of the Collection
Access
Administrative Information
Scope and Content
Related materials in the Huntington Library
Arrangement
Indexing Terms
Overview of the Collection
Title: Jay T. Last Collection of Food Prints and Ephemera
Dates (inclusive): approximately 1845-1964
Bulk dates: approximately 1875-1950
Collection Number: priJLC_Food
Collector:
Last, Jay T.
Extent:
approximately 4,950 items
Repository:
The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens.
Prints and Ephemera
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, California 91108
Phone: (626) 405-2191
Email: reference@huntington.org
URL: http://www.huntington.org
Abstract:
The Jay T. Last Collection of Food Prints and Ephemera contains approximately 4,950 printed items advertising food products
and related businesses from the 1840s to the 1960s, with the bulk of the items
dating from 1875 to 1950. The collection consists largely of lithographed ephemera produced for American businesses affiliated
with the growth, manufacture, packaging, distribution, and sale of food and food products.
Language: English.
Note:
Finding aid last updated on September 22, 2017.
Access
Open to qualified researchers by prior application through the Reader Services Department. For more information, contact Reader
Services.
Administrative Information
Publication Rights
The Huntington Library does not require that researchers request permission to quote from or publish images of this material,
nor does it charge fees for such activities.
The responsibility for identifying the copyright holder, if there is one, and obtaining necessary permissions rests with the
researcher.
Preferred Citation
[Item title, Call number]. Jay T. Last Collection of Food Prints and Ephemera, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.
Provenance
This collection forms part of the Jay T. Last Collection of Graphic Arts and Social History, which was
donated to the Huntington Library by Jay T. Last in 2005 as a gift in progress. The bulk of the food prints and ephemera were transferred to the Library between 2010 and 2013.
Background
The Jay T. Last Collection is an unparalleled archive of printed paper artifacts that documents American lithographic, social,
and business history. The collection began in the early 1970s when
physicist and Silicon Valley pioneer Jay Last moved to Southern California and started collecting citrus box labels he found
at local flea markets and rummage sales. As his collection grew,
Last realized that these labels conveyed important information about commercial printing, graphic design, and social history,
and he expanded his collection to include other forms
of American visual culture. Today this collection contains more than 200,000 lithographic prints, posters, and ephemera of
mostly nineteenth- and early twentieth- century American
origin and represents works by more than five hundred lithographic companies.
Scope and Content
The Jay T. Last Collection of Food Prints and Ephemera contains approximately 4,950 printed items advertising food products
and related businesses in the United States from the 1840s to the 1960s, with the bulk of the items
dating from 1875 to 1950. The collection consists largely of ephemera produced for American businesses affiliated with the
growth, manufacture, packaging, distribution, and sale of food and food products. Most of these items
are color lithographs, but hand-colored and uncolored engravings and woodcuts are also included.
Materials are arranged in two series: small-size items (11 x 14 inches or less) and large-size items (more than 11 x 14 inches).
Small-size items are described broadly at the series level; large-size items and select small-size items are fully inventoried
and all printers,
artists, and publishers are indexed by name. The collection includes over 45 large-size items comprised mainly of lithographed
advertising prints and product labels. Small-size items number approximately
4,900 and contain a variety of promotional materials, including trade cards, product labels, and printed billheads and letterheads
with manuscript text.
The collection highlights food production, merchandising, distribution, purveying, and consumption, and the images provide
a rich resource for studying the history
of such American industries as canning, packaging, and manufacturing along with the evolution of their advertising in the
19th and early 20th centuries.
As graphic materials, the prints and ephemera offer evidence of developing techniques and trends in commercial printing, and
of the artists, engravers, lithographers, printers,
and publishers involved in the creative process.
Please note that food starch can be found in the Jay T. Last Collection of Household Goods Prints and Ephemera (in process).
Food starch and laundry starch are grouped together because both were often made or distributed by the same companies and
advertised together.
Note
The Jay T. Last Collection is a gift in progress. Container numbers may change as
the collection expands.
Alternative Form of Materials Available
Related materials in the Huntington Library
Arrangement
Items are arranged broadly by size in two series, which have been further arranged in subseries according to business and/or
product type:
- Series I. Food Prints and Ephemera (small size)
- Subseries A. Baby Food (small size)
- Subseries B. Confections (small size)
- Subseries C. Fruit and Vegetable Products (small size)
- Subseries D. Grain Products (small size)
- Subseries E. Ingredients (small size)
- Subseries F. Meat and Meat Products (small size)
- Subseries G. Purveyors (small size)
- Subseries H. Seafood (small size)
- Series II. Food Prints and Ephemera (large size)
- Subseries A. Confections (large size)
- Subseries B. Fruit and Vegetable Products (large size)
- Subseries C. Grain Products (large size)
- Subseries D. Ingredients (large size)
- Subseries E. Meat and Meat Products (large size)
- Subseries F. Purveyors (large size)
- Subseries G. Seafood (large size)
Indexing Terms
Genres
Advertisements.
Billheads.
Business cards.
Chromolithographs.
Ephemera.
Ephemera -- United States -- 19th century.
Ephemera -- United States -- 20th century.
Intaglio prints.
Labels.
Letterheads.
Lithographs.
Printed ephemera.
Promotional materials.
Relief prints.
Trade cards.
Views.
Subjects
Advertising -- Baked products.
Advertising -- Farm produce.
Advertising -- Food.
Advertising -- Spice trade.
Bread -- Pictorial works.
Canning & preserving.
Chewing gum industry.
Cocoa.
Condiments -- Pictorial works.
Farms -- Pictorial works.
Flour mills -- Pictorial works.
Fruit -- Pictorial works.
Grain -- Pictorial works.
Grocers -- Pictorial works.
Industrial buildings -- Pictorial works.
Livestock -- Pictorial works.
Meat industry and trade.
Mills and mill-work -- Pictorial works.
Orchards -- Pictorial works.
Seafood industry.
Storefronts -- Pictorial works.
Vegetables -- Pictorial works.
Vineyards -- Pictorial works.
Printer, Publisher, Artist Index
The following is a complete list of printers, publishers, and artists represented in the large-size items in this collection.
A. Trochsler & Co.
August Gast & Co.
Bencke, Herman.
Boston Bank Note Co.
Campbell, James (Inspector of Provisions)
Currier & Ives.
Gunn, Bliss & Co.
H. Gugler & Son.
Hatch Lith. Co.
Henderson-Achert-Krebs Lithographing Co.
Herline & Co.
J. Mayer & Co.
J.H. Bufford's Sons Lith.
Kilburn, Samuel Smith.
Lakeside Press (Portland, Me.)
Mayer & Stetfield.
Morgan & Hamilton Co.
Palmer, C.
Rease, W. H.
Richmond Lith. Co.
Rochester Lith. & Print Co.
Schmidt Label & Litho. Co.
Shober & Carqueville.
Skeen & Stuart Stationery Co.
Stahl & Jaeger.
Wagner & M’Guigan.
Wells & Hope Co.
Wilmanns Bros. Co.
Wogram, Fred.