Millinery Ad Question

[J. Donaldson]

I was doing some research for my local Civil War round table this past week with one of the local newspapers and came across this ad.

"Mrs. McDonald
Informs the Ladies of Macomb and McDonough County [Illinois], that she has just received a stock of Goods from Chicago. Also, she has on hand Crape, Silk, and Straw Bonnets, Ruches, Flowers, Ribbons, etc., which she will sell at her lowest price. Also, some extra-fine Straw Bonnets. She will take flour, bacon Hams, Butter, Lard, etc., in exchange for goods. Shop near the Presbyterian Church."

I'm used to seeing ads for barter attached to grocery and general merchandise stores, but I was rather caught off guard at a milliner advertising in this way. With generalities of region and rural/urban economy aside, is this unusual for our period of interest, or does this ad simply portray the work of a milliner on the lower end of the economic spectrum?

I thought the ad very interesting and thought I would pass it along here. Moderators, if this is in the wrong venue, my apologies.

[OlszowyTM]

Re: Millinery Ad Question

What was the date of the ad?

[ElizabethClark]

Re: Millinery Ad Question

It's the perfect spot, actually. :)

I, too, would be interested in the date and location of the ad. It's less typical for a non-food store to advertise accepting barter, but if the milliner is in a cash-poor area, it sure makes good business sense to trade non-edibles she can produce for edibles she can sell or eat herself.

[J. Donaldson]

Re: Millinery Ad Question

My apologies for the incomplete information. I posted this late last night and have been out of the house all day.

The advertisement ran in the October 27, 1860 edition of the Macomb Weekly Journal, bottom right corner of page four. While I can't find a population for Macomb in 1860, the county had just shy of 21,000 residents in the 1860 census. While I don't know the economic breakdown of the county, it was overwhelmingly agricultural in nature, with only small local industry in Macomb (the county seat) and the four or five scattered towns.

[OlszowyTM]

Re: Millinery Ad Question

I was definitely not expecting a pre war date. It might be worthwhile to look into the robustness of the banking system in that area. Actual cash notes may very well have been in short supply.

[Hank Trent]

Re: Millinery Ad Question

In the 1860 census, it's probably Bathsheba McDonald, age 60, milliner, 3,000 real estate and $25 personal estate, born in Kentucky, living with Rufus, 15 and Millen (?), 19-year-old male laborer.

From Ancestry.com, Mrs. Bathsheba Lewis married William McDonald in McDonough Co., IL, Aug. 2, 1836. I'd guess that was her second husband, who'd died by 1860.

This history of the county mentions that money was scarce from the 1837 panic through 1845:

http://books.google.com/books?id=TNjVAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA60

Most I could suggest was that at her age, she'd remember those times well, and kept up the custom even if money was in greater supply.

Hank Trent
hanktrent@gmail.com

[J. Donaldson]

Re: Millinery Ad Question

I do know that the Panic of 1857 was still playing rather heavily in county, as well as this region of the Midwest as a whole.