Merchant Trade Cards Were Useful Advertising Tools
A customer might walk into a Middle Susquehanna Valley store for a pair of shoes or a few household necessities and leave with something extra—a small, colorful advertising card. Surviving cards offer glimpses of the goods they sold—and the imaginative ways they tried to catch a customer’s eye.
November 09, 2026
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Terry Diener
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Additional Credits:
Arnold and Deanne Kaplan Collection of Early American Judcaica/ Penn Libraries/ University of Pennsylvania; American Antiquarian Society (Trade Cards); Cornell University Library, Trade Cards: An Illustrated History; Harvard Business School, The Art of American Advertising: Trade Cards. Photo Credit: Arnold and Deanne Kaplan Collection of Early American Judcaica/ Penn Libraries/ University of Pennsylvania/ http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-US/1.0; Find a Grave: Memorial ID 22985003
