Jay T. Last Collection of Medicine Prints and Ephemera, approximately 1750-approximately 1929, bulk 1850-1910

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Summary

Creators:
Last, Jay T.
Abstract:
The Jay T. Last Collection of Medicine Prints and Ephemera contains over 4,000 printed items related to medical, dental, and vision products and services in the United States from approximately 1750 to 1929, with the bulk of the content dating from 1850 to 1910. Most items are lithographs, but engravings and woodcuts are also included. The collection deals with medical and drug-related advertising and practice including the tools, equipment, and supplies used by the medical field in the United States during the 19th and early 20th centuries. This includes the wide and varied assortment of patent medicines that proliferated during this time.
Extent:
approximately 4,030 items
Language:
English.
Preferred citation:

[Item title, Call number]. Jay T. Last Collection of Medicine Prints and Ephemera, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.

Background

Scope and content:

The Jay T. Last Collection of Medicine Prints and Ephemera contains over 4,000 printed items related to medical, dental, and vision products and services in the United States from approximately 1750 to 1929, with the bulk of the content dating from 1850 to 1910. Most items are lithographs, but engravings and woodcuts are also included. The collection deals with medical and drug-related advertising and practice including the tools, equipment, and supplies used by the medical field in the United States during the 19th and early 20th centuries. This includes products and services relating to human health care and the remedies to treat, relieve, and cure medical, dental, and vision conditions as prescribed or administered by doctors, pharmacists, dentists, and quack practitioners often affiliated with patent medicine manufacturers, drug companies, hospitals, asylums, institutes, and/or sanitariums.

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 with printers, artists, and publishers indexed by name. The collection includes 30 large-size items comprised mainly of advertising prints and leaflets. Small-size items number approximately 4,000 and contain a variety of materials, including trade cards, product labels, stationery, calendars, booklets, leaflets, periodicals, and printed billheads and letterheads (with and without manuscript text). Of note are over 150 product labels for remedies offered by Dr. A. De Fontaine of Boston, Massachusetts, circa 1840-1850, and approximately 100 items of advertising ephemera for products made by C. I. Hood & Co. of Lowell, Massachusetts.

The collection supports various fields of research relating to medical and drug-related merchandising, advertising, and practice in the United States in the 19th and early 20th centuries. This includes the wide and varied assortment of patent medicines that proliferated during this time. The images provide a rich visual resource for studying the history of American medical practitioners, methods, and materials, as well as a perspective on ailments and illnesses common during this period. As graphic materials, the collection highlights developing techniques and trends in printmaking while documenting the artists, engravers, lithographers, printers, and publishers involved in the creative process.

Biographical / historical:

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.

Acquisition information:
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 Medicine prints and ephemera were transferred to the Library between 2010 and 2012 .
Arrangement:

The collection is arranged in the following two series:

  • Series I. Medicine Prints and Ephemera (small size)
  • Series II. Medicine Prints and Ephemera (large size)

Rules or conventions:
Finding aid prepared using Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Note:

Finding aid last updated on June 16, 2017.

Access and use

Restrictions:

Open to qualified researchers by prior application through the Reader Services Department. For more information, contact Reader Services.

Terms of access:

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 Medicine Prints and Ephemera, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.

Location of this collection:
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108, US
Contact:
(626) 405-2191
reference@huntington.org
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