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Some Evidence for the Sale and Distribution of Kellogg Prints
Nancy Finlay
The Connecticut Historical Society
Presented at
“Representations of Economy:
Lithography in America from 1820 to 1860”
The Ninth Annual Conference of the Program in Early American Economy and Society
Co-Sponsored with the
Visual Culture Program and “Philadelphia on Stone”
At the Library Company of Philadelphia
1314 Locust Street, Philadelphia, PA
Friday, October 15, 2010
2
Daniel Wright Kellogg opened a lithography shop on Main Street in Hartford,
Connecticut sometime between 1830 and 1833.1 Although there were experiments with
the new process as early as the late 1810s in Philadelphia, and fledgling lithographers
established businesses in New York and Philadelphia in the 1820s, few of these
establishments were long-lived. Commercial lithography was still in its infancy in 1830,
and Daniel Kellogg was one of the industry‟s pioneers. The business that he founded
would go on to become one of most prolific, successful, and enduring lithographic
printing houses in America.2 It‟s difficult to know exactly what Daniel had in mind when
he established his business. Correspondence with his youngest brother, Elijah Chapman
Kellogg, suggests he was motivated by his personal ambitions as an artist, ambitions that
Elijah evidently shared.3 Even if this is true, however, it is apparent that the Kelloggs
were shrewd businessmen as well as would-be artists. Within a few years, they were
distributing their prints to a very broad national market, extending far into the South and
mid-West.
In the absence of business records, evidence for these early years is largely
circumstantial, but highly suggestive. Daniel Kellogg had some experience in the
clockmaking industry prior to opening his lithography business, and a letter from
Eliphalet Bulkeley, another Hartford businessman, regarding a shipment of clocks in
Wheeling, West Virginia, suggests that he was involved in selling clocks on a national
scale by the late 1820s.4 Shelf clocks were among the stock-in-trade of the typical
“Yankee peddler,” and it is interesting to speculate that Daniel‟s knowledge of available
transportation networks and distribution strategies may have originated in this context. It
seems likely that the same methods that were being used to successfully market clocks
might have worked equally well for distributing and selling lithographic prints. An 1833
letter from “D.W. Kellogg & Co.” to a “Mr. J. Richardson” in Washington, North
Carolina, clearly demonstrates that the firm was selling large numbers of lithographs in
the South by this date:
Hartford Nov 8th
1833
“Mr. J. Richardson,
Sir,
We have found an opportunity to send your box of prints this day to N. York by a person
who will see them on board the packet as you direct.
3
“You will see by the bill, which you
will find in the box, that we have sent
you but 8 instead of 20 Jacksons
portrait being all we have, but we think
the deficiency amply repaired in other
respects. Our assortment is much
better than when you were here and we
have selected [for] you a lot which
will please you. We first [started] with
500 col[ored] and found the box would
hold more and filled it, making out 100
plain and 500 col[ored] in all. We put
the bill in the box and sent it to N.
York by Mr. G. Welton.”
Hartford Nov 16th
1833
“Mr. Richardson
We concluded to delay writing you
about the prints until the return of M.
W. from N. York. He has this day returned and has delivered the box of prints to Capt.
Davidson, Sch[ooner] Franklin. The captain gave a receipt for the box and agreed to
deliver it to Edwin Barnes. Perhaps you may receive them before you do this but we
think proper to write you by mail as the time of passage in by water is uncertain and we
are in circumstances that require us to make use of the [?] of our work as soon as rec‟d.
Wish you to forward a check on a bank in New York that is good and enclose it in a letter
and forward it to us as soon as convenient.
“Respectfully yours,
D.W. Kellogg & Co.”
“1833 Mr. John Richardson
Bot of D.W. Kellogg & Co.
Nov 9th
500 col‟d prints at 10 50.00
Nov 9th
100 Plain do. do. 6 6.00
do. do. Box .077
Please excuse mistake in date of bill forwarded in the box with the prints.
D.W. Kellogg & Co.”5
4
It is clear from this letter that prints were being
sent to North Carolina by coastal packet by way
of New York; colored prints were selling for 10
cents apiece (wholesale); uncolored, black-and-
white versions of the prints were selling for 6
cents apiece. Richardson‟s role is not entirely
clear; he would either have sold the prints in his
own shop in North Carolina, re-sold them
through agents acting as travelling salesmen (as
would be the case later), or re-sold them to one or
more third parties for retail sale. The popularity
of prints of Andrew Jackson (fig. 1) is notable;
Jackson was President from 1828 to 1837, and
Presidential portraits were apparently always
among the Kelloggs‟ best-selling prints; in
addition, Jackson, a Southerner himself, would
presumably have been especially popular in the
South.6 Even at this early date, most of the
Kelloggs‟ output was intended for the wholesale
market. Retail sales at their shop on Main Street, Hartford (fig. 2), apparently were never
a significant part of their business activity.7
It is striking that the Kelloggs never placed advertisements for their prints in
the Hartford Daily Courant, though they did occasionally place advertisements there
when they were looking for apprentices or for women to hand color their prints.8
Advertisements for prints commissioned by local organizations and individuals and
printed—but not published by the Kelloggs—did sometimes appear in the Courant.
Significantly, these prints were not offered for sale at the Kellogg shop, but could be
purchased elsewhere in Hartford.9
Daniel Kellogg left Hartford in 1836 to go West, eventually settling in
southeastern Wisconsin.10
His two younger brothers, Edmund Burke Kellogg and Elijah
Chapman, remained in charge of the lithography business, which in 1840, officially
became known as E.B. & E.C. Kellogg, the name which it would bear for most of the
remainder of its existence.11
By the 1840s, the business of lithography, which was in its
infancy when the Kelloggs‟ founded their firm in Hartford in 1830, had expanded greatly
and become highly competitive. While several competing lithographic firms were active
in Hartford during these early years,12
New York City had assumed increased importance
as a center of the lithographic trade, and lithographic printers and publishers clustered
along Fulton Street, Nassau Street, and adjoining portions of Broadway, just below City
5
Hall, with easy access to the nearby docks. James Baillie, Nathaniel Currier, George &
William Endicott, George Hayward, Jones & Newman, Francis Michelin, Louis Nagel,
and Sarony & Major were all situated in this immediate area.13
Edmund and Elijah
Kellogg opened their own office at 144 Fulton Street in 1846, in partnership with the
New York publisher Horace Thayer.14
Although Kelloggs & Thayer lasted little more than a year, this was an extremely
productive period for the firm; more Kellogg prints survive from 1846-1847 than from
any other comparable period of the firm‟s existence. The Mexican War may have been a
factor in increased competition between lithographers during the mid-1840s, in the
Kelloggs‟ decision to open an office in New York, and in their remarkable productivity
during this period. A series of highly original and extremely interesting prints of the
Mexican War (fig. 3) bear the imprints both of Kelloggs & Thayer and E.B. & E.C.
Kellogg, and, in some cases of Dwight Needham, who served as the Kelloggs‟ distributor
in Buffalo, perhaps beginning as early 1845.15
Thayer continued to be involved in the
distribution of Kellogg prints at least through the mid-1850s.
Although the Kelloggs‟ Hartford imprint appears on virtually all of the prints that
they printed and published in the 1840s, 50s, and 60s, with the exception of a few
6
Kellogg & Thayer prints, which bear only a New York imprint, the names of other firms
and individuals, such as Horace Thayer and Dwight Needham, almost always are
included as well. As far as is known, none of these other firms actually printed
lithographs. In most cases, lithographic prints were only part of these firms‟ stock in
trade, which usually included maps and could also include books, photographs,
stationery, and novelties. A number of these publishers were originally from Connecticut,
and may have known the Kelloggs before they moved to New York.16
Although the
Kelloggs‟ association with some of these firms was apparently brief and temporary, in
other cases it was far more enduring. Clearly the Kelloggs relied on these contacts in
distinct cities to assure the prompt and efficient distribution of their prints.
After Horace Thayer moved to Buffalo in 1848, George Whiting, who had
previously served as a clerk in the offices of Kelloggs & Thayer, became the Kelloggs‟
principle New York agent. Whiting continued to work directly for the Kelloggs until
1860, when they closed their New York office. The name “G. Whiting” continues to
appear on Kellogg prints until 1862, when Whiting died and his son, Frank P. Whiting,
took over as the Kelloggs‟ co-publisher and distributor. The imprint “F.P. Whiting”
appears on prints issued between 1862 and 1866.17
During the same period, from 1859
to1864, Phelps & Watson, map and print publishers with premises at 18 Beekman Street,
were also distributing Kellogg prints in New York City.18
The imprints “E.B. & E.B.
Kellogg”, “Phelps & Watson,” and “G. Whiting” or “F.P. Whiting” frequently appear
together on prints from these years. The changes in firm names and addresses make it
relatively easy to date Kellogg prints from the Civil War period. During the 1850s and
1860s, the imprints of D.M. Dewey of Rochester, New York, and Rufus Blanchard and
Golden & Sammons of Chicago also appear on some Kellogg prints.19
The westward
expansion of the Kelloggs‟ distribution network parallels the extension of the railroad
system across New York State, suggesting that, at least by the 1850s and 60s, the
Kelloggs were shipping their prints west by rail, or possibly by a combination of rail and
canal boat.
An article describing the Kelloggs‟ business that appeared in the Hartford Daily
Courant in 1849 makes it very clear that at this date, they intended to reach a widely
distributed popular audience with their prints. The article describes in detail a visit to the
Kelloggs‟ establishment and includes information that could only have been derived from
discussion with Kelloggs and their employees. After a brief history of the progress of
lithography in America, the article states that “Prints are now produced…. at a price
which brings them within easy reach of all classes. Scarcely a cottage or hamlet can be
found, however obscure or isolated, but what displays upon its walls specimens of this
art.”20
A remarkable series of letters between Edmund Kellogg and his son Charles (fig.
4) documents how exactly how Kellogg prints were reaching the obscure cottages and
7
hamlets of southern New Jersey during 1862.21
The letters describe how Charles sold
prints door-to-door in the pine woods “where cabins were scarce,” to exactly the kind of
audience evoked in the 1849 article.
As an old man in the early 20th
century, Charles transcribed copies of these
letters for his children, adding additional
comments about the family business. For
example, he states that “E. B. & E.C.
Kellogg published a great variety of pictures
12 x 14” and painted the lithographs in
watercolors. The wholesale price was five
cents each. The popular subjects were
Flowers, Children & Catholic pictures.
School teachers gave them to pupils at the
end of a term. Clock makers also used
them.”22
Charles‟s knowledge was based on
his experiences as a sales agent for the
family firm, or, as he put it, “as a peddler of
my father‟s pictures of war scenes &c.” At
the same time, he was also selling—or attempting to sell—copies of a book about the
American Revolution.23
The first letter, from Edmund to Charles, contains detailed information about
wholesale and retail prices, but no information about how the prints were to be conveyed
to Charles in New Jersey. Edmund‟s reference to “his dealer” is intriguing. Is he
referring to his agent in New York City—at this date, presumably George Whiting—or to
a local dealer in the Philadelphia area? Charles‟s later letters were written from Mount
Holly and Bordentown, both places much nearer to Philadelphia than to New York, but it
is possible that he was still in New York at the end of January 1862, and he presumably
would have had to pass through the city again on his return to Hartford. Edmund writes:
“Hartford, Jany. 30th
, 1862
Dear Charles,
Yours of the 28th
is recd. & I have just selected your 150 Prints, which will help pay
expenses I hope; you can retail them for from 10 to 15 cents, but if they want a number at
one place I would sell them for one dollar per dozen or as low as 75 cents a dozen if you
cannot get more and when you get most sold out, if my dealer will give you 4 cents
apiece and take the balance, let him have them and the folio for 37 ½ cents if he wont
give 50 cents, but had better return them rather than sell them for anything less….
8
Yours affectionately,
E.B. Kellogg.”
It is interesting to note that the prices in 1861 are actually lower than in 1833. In
1833, D.W. Kellogg & Co. was charging 10 cents apiece for colored prints, but this was
the wholesale price, not the retail price. In 1861, E.B. Kellogg was willing to accept as
little as 4 cents apiece and was instructing Charles to offer them at one dollar per dozen
(about 8 cents apiece) or seventy-five cents per dozen (about 6 cents apiece). By 1861,
all Kellogg prints were being sold colored; “plain” or black-and-white prints were no
longer an option.24
Approximately two weeks later, Charles reports that book sales are not going
well. He comments on the proximity of Philadelphia and the presence of Philadelphia
book agents, who are apparently competing with him for what little business there is and
on the delay in receiving shipments from Hartford. Again, he does not explain how the
shipments are being sent.
“Mt. Holly, N. J. Feb. 16th
, 1862
Dear Father-
I have difficulty in selling the book called “The American Revolution” in this city. Many
have gone to war and business men are slow to be interested. I do not get much
encouragement to explain my work, but I do not leave a man before he understands the
value of it. I worked two days and did not get a single name. Thursday and Friday I got
three each day. A wealthy farmer and quite a well read man was influenced by the
promise of a red cover and gilt edges as a splendid parlor book, and another wanted a
durable book bound in sheepskin.
“The mud is knee deep in the country, but there is work enough in this city, but it is poor
pay so far. I can go to Philadelphia for thirty-seven cents and book agents come here
from that city. The principal excuse is „no money and I cannot get money.‟ Owing to
delay in sending books from Hartford I lost four sales on my last delivery.
I would like to see a weekly COURANT.
Yours truly,
Chas. E. Kellogg”
Edmund‟s next surviving note accompanied a box of 500 prints, suggesting that
the first 150 prints had already found purchasers.
“Hartford, March 12th
, 1862
Dear Chas.:
9
With this you will receive 500 Prints which I hope you will sell well and then set your
face for home…..
Yours in haste,
E.B.K.”
In his next letter, Charles confirmed that he was having much better luck selling
lithographs for a few pennies apiece than he had selling subscriptions to a “parlor book”
with red covers and gilt edges for a few dollars.
“Bordentown, N.J.
Mch. 26th
, 1862
Dear Father-
I was not disappointed in the sales of pictures and came to this place Friday with an
empty portfolio. I sold a good many of them at six cents each to be sold again. I expect
to do the same with the bundle just received. I have been in the pine woods most of the
week. Houses and cabins are scarce, but when found I almost always made a sale. I
crossed many nice looking streams, but they have not any trout in them. I stopped one
night near a very pleasant lake and the landlord caught some fish for breakfast. These
taverns have charged 60 cts. For lodging and breakfast, and sometimes take pay in
pictures at 12 ½ cts. Each. One school teacher bought 20 at eight cents each and most
every day some one takes from six to ten at seventy-five cents a dozen….
“I think I can sell the 500 pictures in about 16 days. I enclose a draft for 60 dollars, most
of which I owe you. I depend on my sales next week for pocket money. I will write again
in about one week.
“Remember me to all friends at home.
“Yours affectionately,
C.E. Kellogg”
10
This letter, the most interesting of the
entire series, describes Charles‟ experiences
in some detail. He describes bartering with
tavern keepers for his room and board at the
rate of 60 cents per night, or about five
prints at 12 ½ cents apiece. These may well
have been early Civil War subjects, since in
the notes accompanying his transcripts of the
letters, Charles specifically says that he was
selling his “father‟s pictures of war scenes.”
Perhaps they included some of the clever
Civil War cartoons featuring animals which
are among the Kelloggs‟ most original and
entertaining prints. The Eagle’s Nest was
“entered according to Act of Congress, in
the year 1861, by E.B. & E.C. Kellogg in the
Clerks‟ Office of the District Court of
Connecticut;” Uncle Sam. On Secession (fig.
5), though lacking a copyright statement,
must have been published about the same time.25
Scenes from the first few months of the
war, such as Attack upon Fort Sumter April 12th
& 13th
, 1861, by the Southern Rebels and
the Kelloggs‟ three prints of the Battle of Bull Run would also have been among those
available.26
Charles was also selling prints to teachers, charging 8 cents apiece, in contrast to
12 ½ cents apiece for tavern keepers. Eight cents also represents a discount on the retail
price of 10 to 15 cents apiece recommended by Charles‟s father. This is probably
because the teachers were purchasing the prints in bulk—20 prints in this case—and not
an early example of an educational discount. Edmund had recommended selling the
prints for a dollar or 75 cents per dozen “if they want a number at one place,” and Charles
said that “almost every day” he was selling six to ten for seventy-five cents per dozen.
Pricing was very flexible and evidently very much at the discretion of the individual
agent. The teachers used the lithographs that they purchased as rewards of merit,
awarding them to students at the end of the school term. A number of prints in the
graphics collection at the Connecticut Historical Society were used in this way and have
inscriptions on them from teachers to their pupils.27
Charles‟s statement that “Houses
and cabins are scarce, but when found I almost always made a sale,” is first person
testimony that Kellogg prints were indeed finding their way into every “cottage [and]
hamlet…, however obscure or isolated.”
11
Only one more letter from Edmund Kellogg, indicating receipt of Charles‟s draft
for $60.00, has survived:
“Hartford, April 3, 1862
Dear Charles:
Your enclosed draft for Sixty Dollars came duly to had. Hope you will have good luck in
selling out and return as early as possible….”
Yours aff.
E.B.K.”
Charles returned home to Hartford, where on August 21, 1862, he enlisted in the
20th
Connecticut Volunteers. He served throughout the Civil War, mustering out on June
13, 1865.28
Upon his return from the war, Charles went back to work for the family firm. On
November 13, 1865, he became a limited partner, thereby assuming a much more
responsible position.29
Although still involved in sales, he was apparently now focusing
on the Kelloggs‟ corporate clients, rather than selling prints door to door out of his
knapsack. The evidence for Charles‟s activity during this period is his salesman‟s sample
book, which includes specimens of business documents printed by E.B. & E.C. Kellogg
in 1866 and by Kellogg & Bulkeley in 1867.30
Although the hand-written title page of
the book reads: “Sales Book of C. E. Kellogg / Lithographic Samples of E.B. & E.C.
Kellogg printed in 1867,” William H. Bulkeley and Frank Bulkeley joined with Edmund
and Elijah Kellogg to form Kellogg & Bulkeley on January 2, 1867, so printing done
during that year would borne the latter imprint.31
Both imprints appear on the business
forms in the sample book. William H. Bulkeley was the son of Eliphalet Adams
Bulkeley, who had written to Daniel Kellogg about a shipment of clocks in the 1830s.
Frank Bulkeley was William‟s cousin.
12
Charles‟s sample book is of particular
interest because it documents the wide
geographic range of the Kelloggs‟s business
activity at this time.32
Although most of the
forms are for Hartford businesses, others are
for companies in northern New England,
New York State, the South, and the mid-
West. Cities represented include Albany,
New York; Bangor, Maine; Chicago, Illinois;
Cleveland, Ohio; Columbus, Georgia;
Holyoke, Massachusetts; Montpelier,
Vermont; Nashua, New Hampshire;
Nashville, Tennessee; New York, New York;
Newark, New Jersey; Peoria, Illinois;
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Providence,
Rhode Island. Towns in Connecticut in
addition to Hartford include Middletown,
Thomaston, and Tolland. More than half of
the forms were printed for banks and
insurance companies. This is not surprising,
given the prominence of these two industries in Hartford. However, of the eighteen
insurance companies represented; only eight were Hartford based: the Aetna Stock
Insurance Company, the Charter Oak Insurance Company (fig. 6), the Connecticut
Mutual Insurance Company, the Continental Insurance Company, the Hartford Fire
Insurance Company, the Putnam Fire Insurance Company, and the Travelers Insurance
Company. Ten others were widely scattered throughout the eastern United States: the
Albany City Insurance Company, the Cleveland Insurance Company (fig. 8), the
13
Excelsior Insurance Company, the Georgia Home Insurance Company, the
Guardian Fire & Marine Insurance Company, the Holyoke Mutual Fire Insurance
Company, the Home Insurance Company, the Middlesex Insurance Company, the New
Jersey Mutual Life Insurance Company, and the Union Insurance Company. Although
most of the banks represented were located in Hartford, notable exceptions include the
First National Bank of Nashville, Tennessee. In an interview in 1974, William Bulkeley,
a descendant of the William H. Bulkeley who joined forces with the Kelloggs in 1867,
claimed that Nashville was a major distribution center for Kellogg prints in the South.33
Scant evidence for this Nashville distribution center has been found, and its existence has
been doubted, but Charles Kellogg‟s sample book includes three pieces of printing done
for Nashville firms: the First National Bank of Nashville, Marshall & Bruce, and the
Treasurer of the Corporation of Nashville. All three are signed by Marshall & Bruce, not
by E.B. & E.C. Kellogg or Kellogg & Bulkeley, but the letterhead for Marshall & Bruce
identifies the firm as a “blank book manufacturers and bookbinders,” not as lithographers
or printers. In fact, Marshall & Bruce is just the kind of enterprise that acted as the
Kelloggs‟ distributor in other urban centers. No Nashville imprint ever appeared on any
of the Kelloggs‟ pictorial prints, but the Marshall & Bruce imprint on the three Nashville
business forms, may indicate their role as the Kelloggs‟ distributor in that city. This also
raises the possibility that the Kelloggs may have had similar contacts in other cities in
other parts of the country of which nothing is known.
Although Charles Kellogg‟s sample book features far more banks and insurance
companies than any other types of businesses, a few examples of printing for other types
of businesses are included. An especially fine example of color printing—printed in gold
ink—was executed for Walter Treleavens Gold
Pen Manufactory of Chicago, Illinois. Printing
for a box meant to contain German Cathartic
Lozenges (fig. 8) included text in German as well
as English and a copyright statement dated 1867.
Other samples include labels for Bay Rum Soap,
Brown‟s Teething Cordial, and J.C. Rushton‟s
Cod Liver Oil. Printing of this kind, which
presumably constituted a large proportion of the
job printing produced by most lithographers,
seems under-represented in Charles‟s sample
book. Perhaps the small scale of the sample
book—it measures only 5 x 11 ½ inches—
precluded the inclusion of some forms of
commercial printing. The oblong format seems
14
ideally suited for business forms such as blank checks, letterheads, and billheads, and this
is exactly the kind of documents that make up most of its contents.
It is striking that as early as the late 1860s, companies as far west as Chicago, as
far south as Atlanta, Georgia, and as far north as Bangor, Maine, were ordering their
business forms from a lithographic printer in Hartford, Connecticut, rather than relying
on more local lithographers. This suggests that communications must have been
remarkably good and that shipping costs must have been remarkably low. It also
suggests that the Kelloggs were remarkably good at promoting their work and soliciting
business. The communications and transportation networks worked both ways, however,
and Hartford businesses in the 1860s—and even earlier—also had the option of
employing other lithographic firms in other parts of the country for their commercial
printing. In 1864, Colt‟s Fire Arms Manufactory, Samuel Colt‟s enormously successful
gun factory, which was then busily employed cranking out weapons for the Civil War,
was totally destroyed by fire. The business was insured by the Aetna Insurance
Company, who chose to use a dramatic picture of the fire on a large broadside advertising
their services. The scale of the broadside—as eventually executed, it measured 25 x 48
inches—would have posed no problem for the Kelloggs, who had been printing large
folio landscape prints and broadsides since at least 1840.34
Color printing posed more of
a challenge, but, though the Kelloggs continued to employ hand-colorists for the popular
prints they published themselves, by the 1850s, when a customer was willing to pay the
extra cost, the Kelloggs were capable of doing extremely fine color work.35
The directors
of the Aetna Insurance had good reason to be aware of the abilities of the Kellogg firm:
Eliphalet Adams Bulkeley, the father of William H. Bulkeley of Kellogg & Bulkeley,
was one of these directors and his name actually appears in the list of directors printed on
the poster.
Aetna also had another local option. A rival Hartford firm, Bingham & Dodd,
which had opened for business in 1860, actually specialized in color printing.36
Aetna,
however, chose to have the broadside printed by Ehrgott, Forgbriger & Co., in Cincinnati,
rather than employing either of the local Hartford lithographers.37
The poster is far
superior to anything that either E.B. & E.C. Kellogg or Bingham & Dodd could have
produced at this date, so the decision to employ the Cincinnati firm was a wise one.
Their color lithography achieves a painterly effect very different from the precise, linear
color printing characteristic of both E.B. & E.C. Kellogg and Bingham & Dodd.
Although the Kelloggs were printing large landscape prints as early as 1840, and
continued to produce such prints through the 1850s, the most important and imposing
views of Hartford during this period were not produced by local artists and were printed
and published elsewhere. Edwin Whitefield‟s imposing view of Hartford from the Deaf
15
and Dumb Asylum (1849) was printed by Francis Michelin at 111 Nassau Street, New
York and published by Whitefield. 38
John Bachman‟s 1864 view of the City of Hartford
from the west was published by Jacob Weidenmann in Hartford, but was printed by F.
Heppenheimer in New York.39
Bachman‟s huge (25 x 34 in.) 1869 view of Hartford
from the east was printed by P.S. Duval Son & Co. and published by John Weik, both in
Philadelphia.40
The manner in which these itinerant artists and their agents employed
local newspapers to advertise every stage of the production and sale of their prints has
been well-documented by John Reps.41
It is surely no coincidence that the Kelloggs
ceased producing large city views by the mid-1850s, presumably because they were
unable to compete with specialists such as Whitefield and Bachman. The broad
geographical area covered by these artists is a good indication of the ease with which
people and prints were moving around the country by the late 1860s.42
On November 14, 1871, the co-partnership of Charles E. Kellogg, William H.
Bulkeley, and Frank Bulkeley was re-organized as in incorporated stock company, with
William H. Bulkeley as the president.43
In 1873, R.G. Dun & Co., predecessors of Dun
& Bradstreet, who had consistently given the Kellogg firm high ratings up this point,
described the business as a “sort of family concern,” noting that they “earn small
dividends” and “don‟t get much ahead.”44
Frank Bulkeley left the business in 1873.
Charles Kellogg left in 1874, the same year that the Kellogg & Bulkeley Company
moved to a large new building equipped with steam printing presses, located on Pearl
Street, Hartford. The Kellogg name was retained, although, from this point forward, no
Kelloggs were associated the company. In 1877, R.G. Dun noted that the Kellogg &
Bulkeley Company was “under good management” and “had the patronage of large
concerns.”45
By this time, however, the Kellogg & Bulkeley Company had virtually
ceased producing the
kind of the hand-
colored popular prints
for which E.B. & E.C.
Kellogg were once
famous. Most of their
business consisted of
job printing for
customers like those
whom Charles Kellogg
had been soliciting in
the late 1860s. A
series of massive stock books in the library of The Connecticut Historical Society include
examples of similar printing by the Kellogg & Bulkeley Company dating from the early
part of the twentieth century.46
16
_____________________________________________________________
CAPTIONS
Fig. 1. Andrew Jackson. Hand-colored lithograph, printed and published by D.W.
Kellogg & Co., 1830-1840. The Connecticut Historical Society.
Fig. 2. The Kellogg Building, 136 Main Street, Hartford, Connecticut. Albumen print,
ca. 1857. Photographed by G.W. Davis. Private collection.
Fig. 3. Death of Adjt. Genl. George S. Lincoln, at the Battle of Buena Vista, Feby 23d.
1847. Hand-colored lithograph, printed by E.B. & E.C. Kellogg and published by E.B. &
E.C. Kellogg, D. Needham, and S.A. Howland, 1847. The Connecticut Historical
Society.
Fig. 4. Charles Edmund Kellogg. Albumen print, ca. 1862. Private collection.
Fig. 5. Uncle Sam. On Secession. Hand-colored lithograph printed and published by
E.B. & E.C. Kellogg, 1861. The Connecticut Historical Society.
Fig. 6. Advertisement for The Charter Oak Insurance Company. Color lithograph printed
by Kellogg & Bulkeley, ca. 1867. The Connecticut Historical Society, Gift of David S.
Kellogg.
Fig. 7. Billhead or letterhead for The Cleveland Insurance Company. Color lithograph
printed by Kellogg & Bulkeley, ca. 1867. The Connecticut Historical Society, Gift of
David S. Kellogg.
Fig. 8. Box for German Cathartic Lozenges. Color lithograph printed by E.B. & E.C.
Kellogg or Kellogg & Bulkeley, ca. 1866-1867. The Connecticut Historical Society, Gift
of David S. Kellogg.
Fig. 9. Trade card of The Kellogg & Bulkeley Co. Color lithograph printed by The
Kellogg & Bulkeley Co., ca. 1874. The Connecticut Historical Society.
________________________________________________________________
Appendix: “Sales Book of C. E. Kellogg / Lithographic Samples of E.B. & E.C. Kellogg
printed in 1867,”
1. Receipt. Dated 187-. Signed, “Kellogg & Bulkeley Hartford, Conn.”
2. Receipt for Weatherby, Knous & Pelton, 335 & 337 Main St. [Hartford, Conn.]
Dated 186-. Signed “Lith of Kellogg & Bulkeley”
3. Blank check, Dated “Hartford, ------“
4. Check for Kellogg & Bulkeley Lithographers.
5. Blank check, signed “Kellogg & Bulkeley Lith. Hartford, Conn.”
17
6. Blank check, signed, “Kellogg & Bulkeley, Hartford, Ct.”
7. Blank check, signed, “Kellogg & Bulkeley, Hartford, Ct.”
8. Blank check, signed, “Kellogg & Bulkeley, Hartford, Ct.”
9. Check for Mercantile National Bank of Hartford
10. Check for First National Bank of Hartford
11. Letterhead [?] for Home Insurance Company, New York, 1869
12. Letterhead [?] for Home Insurance Company, New York, 1869
13. Letterhead for Office of B.L.T. Bouland, Peoria, Ill. Dated 187-.
14. Letterhead for Union Insurance Company, Bangor, Maine.
15. Blank form for check. Dated 187-.
16. Check for Connecticut River Banking Co. Dated 187-.
17. Check for Farmers & Mechanics National Bank. Hartford. Dated 186-. Signed
“Lith of Kellogg & Bulkeley, Hartford, Ct.”
18. Blank check for Farmers & Mechanics National Bank.
19. Label: “Three cakes / Coburn & Co. / Extra Fine / Bay Rum Soap / Hartford.”
20. Connecticut Fire Insurance Co. Dated 186-. Signed “KELLOGG &
BULKELEY LITH. HARTFORD, CONN.”
21. Office of Smith, Northam & Robinson, Hartford, Conn. Dated 186-. Pray‟s Yarn
& Machinery Agency, Providence, R.I. Dated 186-. Chelsea Savings Bank,
Norwich, Ct. Dated 186-.
22. Office of Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Co., Hartford. Dated 186-
American National Bank, Hartford, Conn. Dated 186-. Office of Collins,
Brothers & Co., Hartford, Conn. Dated 186-.
23. Farmers & Mechanics National Bank, Hartford. Dated 186-. “Lith of Kellogg &
Bulkeley”
24. George W. Williams & Co., Hartford, Conn. Putnam Fire Insurance Company of
Hartford, Conn.
25. Putnam Fire Insurance Company of Hartford, Conn.
26. Treasurer of the Corporation of Nashville. Signed “Marshall & Bruce, Nashville,
Tenn.”
27. Holyoke Mutual Fire Insurance Company of Salem, Massachusetts
28. Office of the New Jersey Mutual Life Insurance co., Newark. Dated 186-
29. Tolland County National Bank. Dated 186-.
30. National Exchange Bank. American National Bank. Hartford Trust Company.
Hartford National Bank.
31. J.C. Rushton, Broadway, New York. Cod Liver Oil.
32. Mercantile National Bank, Hartford, Conn. State of Connecticut, Executive
Department, New Haven. Geo. W. Williams & Co., Wholesale Druggists,
Hartford, Conn.
33. German Cathartic Lozenges. Entered according to Act of Congress in the year
1867 by Wm. M. DuBois in the Clerks Office of the District Court for the
Southern District of New York. Printing for cardboard box. Label also in
German.
34. Thomas Manufacturing Co., Thomaston, Conn. 186-.
35. Hartford National Bank. City National Bank. Phoenix National Bank.
36. The Excelsior Life Insurance Company, New York.
18
37. The Continental Life Insurance Company of Hartford, Conn.
38. American National Bank. Phoenix National Bank. First National Bank.
39. Brown‟s Teething Cordial. Montpelier, Vt.
40. Charter Oak National Bank. State Bank. Farmer‟s & Mechanics National Bank.
41. Charter Oak Life Insurance Company of Hartford, Conn.
42. First National Bank, Nashville. Signed “Marshall & Bruce, Nashville, Tenn.”
43. Charter Oak Fire Insurance Co., Hartford, Conn.
44. The Excelsior Life Insurance Company, New York. Check drawn on The Bank
of New York. Dated 186-. Signed “Lith of Kellogg & Bulkeley, Hartford, Ct.”
45. The Excelsior Life Insurance Company of the City of New York. Signed
“KELLOGG & BULKELEY LITH. HARTFORD, CONN.”
46. Guardian Fire and Marine Insurance Co. of Philadelphia.
47. Walter Treleavens Gold Pen Manufactory. Chicago, Ill.
48. Receipt for Isaac Glazier, Picture & Looking Glass Frames, Dealer in Oil
Paintings, Engravings, Chromo Lithographs, Looking Glass Plates &c. &c.
Hartford, 186-.
49. Hartford Fire Insurance Co.
50. The Putnam Fire Insurance Co., Hartford, Ct. 186-. Check drawn on American
National Bank. Signed, “Lith of E.B. & E.C. Kellogg”
51. Marshall & Bruce, Blank Book Manufacturers, Book Binders & Rulers,
Nashville, Tenn. Signed “Marshall & Bruce, Nashville, Tenn.” S. J. Farnham,
Wholesale Grocer, Hartford, Conn. C.H. Dexter & Sons, Windsor Locks, Conn.
52. Cleveland Insurance Co., Cleveland, O. “KELLOGG & BULKELEY LITH.
HARTFORD, CONN.”
53. Stock certificate: National Storage Company. American National Bank,
Hartford, Conn. 186-.
54. Check for Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Co. Hartford, drawn on First
National Bank. Dated 186-. Signed “Lith of Kellogg & Bulkeley, Hfd.”
55. Georgia Home Insurance Co. of Columbus, Georgia. “KELLOGG &
BULKELEY, HARTFORD, CONN. LITH.”
56. Charter Oak Fire Insurance Co., Hartford, Ct. 186-.
57. Check for Dobson, White & Co., drawn on Farmer‟s & Mechanics National
Bank. Dated 186-. Signed “Lith of Kellogg & Bulkeley”
58. Office of P. Jewell & Sons, Detroit, Mich. 186--. To P. Jewell & Sons, Hartford,
Ct. Aetna Live Stock Insurance Co., Hartford, Conn.
59. Receipt: Own, Toot & Childs, Hartford. 186-.
60. Geo. W. Williams & Co., Wholesale Druggists, Hartford, Conn. J. G. Rathbun,
Apothecary, Hartford. Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance.
61. Check for C. N. Morgan, drawn on The Brooklyn Bank. “Kellogg & Bulkeley,
Hartford, Ct.”
62. Aetna Live Stock Insurance Company, Hartford, Conn. “Lith of Kellogg &
Bulkeley, Hartford” 186-.
63. Middlesex Mutual Assurance Company. Middletown, Ct. 186-.
64. Mercantile National Bank of Hartford.
65. Hartford City Gas Light Company. Stock Certificate.
66. Charter Oak. Continental Soldier at Valley Forge,
19
67. Thomas Manufacturing Co., Thomaston, Conn. Bristol Iron Works. Owego,
N.Y.
68. Albany City Insurance Company, New York. “Lith of Kellogg & Bulkeley,
Hartford, Ct.”
69. Excelsior Life Insurance Company, New York. 186-.
70. Hartford Fire Insurance Co., Hartford Ct. Check drawn on Messrs. Dabney
Morgan & Co., New York. 186-. “Kellogg & Bulkeley Lith. Hartford, Conn.”
71. Nashua Glazed Paper Company. Nashua, N.H. Incorporated 1866.
72. Office of Geo. W. Prentiss, Holyoke, Mass.
73. Stock certificate for National Storage Company, Hartford, Conn. 186-.
74. Home Insurance Company of Columbus, Ohio. “KELLOGG & BULKELEY
LITH. HARTFORD, CT.”
75. Vignettes of Niagara Falls, CT state seal, etc.
76. Pray‟s Yarn and Machinery Agency, Providence, R.I.
Notes
1 The Kelloggs gave various dates for the start of their business, which probably reflect different
moments in its evolution. 1830 is the earliest date given (in an advertisement published in the Hartford Daily Courant in 1860). The firm was clearly in business well before 1834, because correspondence from 1833 indicates substantial activity at by that date. Some Kellogg prints are dated 1832 and 1833. This paper is partially based on research for Nancy Finlay (ed.), Picturing Victorian America: Prints by the Kellogg Brothers of Hartford, Connecticut, 1830-1880 (Hartford, CT: The Connecticut Historical Society, 2009). It represents a greatly expanded version of the account of the Kelloggs’ business practices which are discussed in my essay “From Hartford to Everywhere: The History of the Kellogg Firm and its Associates,” pp. 11-25 in that publication. Much of the research for Picturing Victorian America was conducted by Michael Shortell, a volunteer, and Candice C. Brashears, a research assistant whose position was funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. This paper relies heavily upon their work. Since the completion of the manuscript for Picturing Victorian America, additional material relating to the sale and distribution of Kellogg prints has come to light: Charles Kellogg’s sample book, dating to the late 1860s, was given to The Connecticut Historical Society by David S. Kellogg, a direct descendant, in 2007. David Kellogg also provided a copy of Charles Kellogg’s diary, including transcripts of his correspondence with his father, Edmund Burke Kellogg, while he was selling prints in New Jersey during the early part of 1861. The location of the original diary is unknown, but late in life, Charles Kellogg made several copies for his children; one of these copies belongs to David Kellogg and he has kindly permitted me to reproduce extensive excerpts from it here. David Kellogg, Leslie Kellogg Lyman, and Robert M. Kellogg and his wife Elizabeth C. Kellogg have all very generously shared information about the family and provided substantial support for both the book and the accompanying exhibition, which was on view at The Connecticut Historical Society from January 26-July 17, 2010. 2 Although the last of the Kellogg brothers left the firm in 1867, and Edmund’s son Charles left the
firm in 1874, it retained the Kellogg name and continued as Kellogg & Bulkeley well into the twentieth century. In 1915, an advertisement in the National Lithographer called the firm “the oldest litho house in the United States” still in business at that time. In 1947, Kellogg & Bulkeley merged with Case, Lockwood & Brainard to form Connecticut Printers. Connecticut Printers endured until June 8, 1990.
20
3 In an autograph letter dated June 21, 1830 or 1831, Elijah Kellogg asks his brother Daniel if he
“ever expect[s] to wield the pencil with the dexterity of a Raphael a Lawrence or West…. If so is it not important that [he] exert [him]self for the accomplishment of that great object?.... Happiness is the great oreat object at which we all aim. Allowing that what difference does it make how we obtain it—If you could be more happy in one employment without money than in another with, would you not choose the former? I think you would receive great pleasure in being a painter. I don’t see but you have almost every advantage one can wish. You are just the right age to know what you are about and what is a great requisite, you have I believe a good taste for the art. Suppose you do meet with difficulty. So much the better. It will tend to make you more ardently passionate for the attainment of your effort. Don’t you know that?: E.C. Kellogg papers, The Connecticut Historical Society. Elijah was nineteen or twenty at this time; Daniel was twenty-three or twenty-four. Ironically, no drawings or paintings by Daniel Kellogg are known, but several example of Elijah’s original artwork are in the collections of The Connecticut Historical Society. A drawing by Elijah served as the basis for an early D.W. Kellogg lithograph, The Charter Oak (PVA 142). 4 A lengthy letter from E. A. (Eliphalet Adams) Bulkeley in the E.C. Kellogg papers at The
Connecticut Historical Society refers to a shipment of clocks in Wheeling (then Virginia, now West Virginia) on July 1, 1830. Eliphalet Bulkeley was founder of the Aetna Insurance Company. For more on Daniel Kellogg and clockmaking, see “The Kelloggs and Clocks in Connecticut,” Magazine Antiques (November 2007: Vol. 172, No. 5), pp. 56-58. 5 E. C. Kellogg papers, The Connecticut Historical Society.
6 The clearest evidence for the popularity of individual Kellogg prints comes from an article that
appeared in the Hartford Daily Courant in 1849. At that date, portraits of George Washington were the Kelloggs’ best selling prints, followed by portraits of “Old Rough and Ready,” Zachary Taylor. “Notes by a Man about Town,” The Hartford Daily Courant, Vol. 13 (January 18, 1849), p. 2. Taylor had just been elected President in 1849, so the popularity of his portraits exactly parallels the popularity of the Jackson portraits in the 1830s, when Jackson was the current President. Jackson was born in Tennessee at a time when that state was still part of North Carolina. He was closely associated with both states. 7 In 1834, an advertisement in the Hartford Daily Courant indicated that D.W. Kellogg & Co. were
opening a “wholesale and retail Print Store” a few rods south of City Hotel on Main Street, Hartford (January 6, 1834: Vol. LXX, p. 3). This was the Kelloggs’ second shop on Main Street. A third shop, at 136 Main Street, would open in a new brick building built by the Kelloggs themselves (and known as the Kellogg Building) in 1840. A group of Kellogg prints belonging to Connecticut Landmarks (formerly the Antiquarian & Landmarks Society) were found in the Amasa Day house in Moodus, Connecticut, and apparently were all purchased by Amasa Day and his wife during the 1840s, presumably in the Kelloggs’ Hartford shop. Several of these prints bear only the Kelloggs’ Hartford imprint, though other impressions of the same prints have New York and Buffalo imprints as well, as was typical during this period. It is only twenty-nine miles from Moodus to Hartford. It is also possible, however, that Day could have purchased the prints from a local agent, a travelling salesman who was selling the prints door to door in Moodus, much as Charles Kellogg would later sell Kellogg prints in New Jersey. (see below) 8 D.W. Kellogg & Co. advertised for “2 apprentices” in January and February 1839 (Hartford Daily
Courant, Vol. IV, No. 14, p. 3 and ff.) On December 6, 1850, Kellogg & Comstock placed the following advertisement: “WANTED IMMEDIATELY—A few girls to color prints.” (Hartford Daily Courant, Vol. XIV, No. 293, p. 1). Other advertisements for hand-colorists appears in 1848 and 1849. 9Inna, the Boo’room Slave (PVA 437), “a beautiful colored Print… by D.W. Kellogg & Co.,” was offered for sale “wholesale or retail” at The Depository, No. 7 Asylum Street, Hartford in 1838 (Hartford Daily Courant, Vol. II No. 213, p. 3). Fifty impressions of the E.B. & E.C. Kellogg lithograph, Revd. Joel Hawes, D.D. (PVA 796) were included in an auction by Corning & Co. on September 3 and 4, 1850 (Hartford Daily Courant, Vol. XIV), No. 213 (p. 2). Joseph Ropes’s tinted lithograph of Trinity College (PVA 925), which was printed by E.C. Kellogg, was sold by Bolles & Roberts, a Hartford frame shop (Hartford Daily Courant, Vol. XVL, No. 158), p. 2). Ropes’s lithograph of the Flood of 1854 at Hartford (PVA 318) was also sold by Bolles & Roberts
21
(Hartford Daily Courant, Vol. XVIII, No. 120, p. 2). It’s possible that, because of the prominent location of their shop on Main Street, the Kelloggs didn’t feel a need to advertise locally. However, many local Hartford businesses did advertise regularly in the Courant. 10
Daniel Kellogg left Hartford in 1836 and by 1838 had settled in the Pewaukee and Delafield
area of what was then Wisconsin Territory. There is no evidence that he was ever active as a lithographer in Wisconsin. 11
Both Edmund and Elijah Kellogg were partners in the firm from a very early date, perhaps from the very beginning. The firm assumed their names, E.B. & E.C. Kellogg, in 1840. From 1848 to 1851, John Chenevard Comstock was a partner, and the firm name was first Kelloggs & Comstock (through 1850) and then Kellogg & Comstock (1851), after Edmund Kellogg withdrew from the partnership. E.C. Kellogg was in business by himself through 1855, when Edmund rejoined the firm, which then continued as E.B. & E.C. Kellogg until 1866. Both brothers retired from business in 1867, at which time the firm became Kellogg & Bulkeley, a partnership between Edmund’s son Charles in partnership with William H. Bulkeley and Frank Bulkeley. In 1874, the business was reorganized as an incorporated stock company with William H. Bulkeley as president. Charles Kellogg and Frank Bulkeley were no longer associated with the business as this point. 12
The Kelloggs’ chief rival in Hartford was Lucius Case and his various partners. Case began printing and publishing lithographs in 1834, in partnership with Waters (first name unknown) as Case & Waters. Later partners included A.R. Skinner (Case & Skinner), Roderck Nevers (Case & Nevers), Elias Litchfield (Case & Litchfield), and William Green (Case & Green). Case & Green were in business from 1848 to 1852 and produced some extremely fine work. Other Hartford firms included Colton & Co., a partnership between Frederick P. Colton and Charles H. Coburn that in business in 1847 and 1848, and Alden & Kuchel, a partnership between William C. Alden and Charles Kuchel, also in business in 1848. Colton worked for the Kelloggs before and after opening his own business. Kuchel, a German lithographer, was active in Philadelphia before and after his brief career in Hartford; he went to California in the 1850s, where became one of the most important lithographers to chronicle the Gold Rush. Little is known of lithography firms outside of Hartford. Punderson & Crisand was active in New Haven in the 1860s and possibly earlier. 13
Information regarding the addresses of these firms is from Harry T. Peters, America on Stone: The Other Printmakers to the American People (Garden City, New York: Doubleday Doran and Company, 1931), still the most comprehensive reference on 19
th-century American lithography.
14 Horace Thayer was born in Hartwick, New York in 1811, making him exactly the same age as
Elijah Kellogg. The closeness of the association between Thayer and the Kelloggs, even after the dissolution of Kelloggs & Thayer, is suggested by the title of a catalogue produced jointly by the two firms in 1852: Catalogue of Coloured Prints Published by E.C. Kellogg and Horace Thayer & Co. This confirms that Thayer was co-publisher of the prints, not simply their distributor. Thayer was at this time based in Buffalo. 15
See Elisabeth Hodermarksy, “The Kellogg Brothers’ Images of the Mexican War and the Birth of Modern-Day News,” in Picturing Victorian America, pp. 73-84. 16
Edward Hooker Ensign was born in Hartford in 1818, and was established as a map and book
publisher in New York City by 1841. Thomas Coit Fanning (one of Ensign’s partners) was born in Norwich, Connecticut in 1805, and settled in Rochester, New York, where he pursued a career as a druggist, before moving to Brooklyn, New York about 1849, and becoming a map and chart publisher. Humphrey Phelps was born in Hebron, Connecticut (near the Kellogg brothers’ birthplace in Tolland) in 1799; by 1846 he was publishing maps, charts, and travel guides in New York City. Phelps returned to Hartford in 1868 and died there in 1875. Phelps’ nephew and business partner, Gaylord Watson (b. 1833), also had Connecticut connections. His grandfather, Levi Watson, was from West Hartford, and his grandmother was Abigail Goodman Ensign, suggesting a possible connection with the Ensign map publishers. Genealogical research was conducted by Candice C. Brashears. For more information, see the “Brief Biographies of the Kelloggs and their Immediate Associates,” which she contributed to Picturing Victorian America (pp. 103ff.)
22
17In 1866, Whiting added photographs to his sales line. He later formed a partnership with his younger brother Arthur and became an art dealer. See Picturing Victorian America, p. 127. 18
The firm dissolved on January 1, 1865 (R.G. Dun & Co., Vol. 196, Baker Library, Harvard University School of Business Administration). 19
Dellon Marcus Dewey was a prominent and successful Rochester nurseryman. The Kelloggs produced a number of prints for his sales catalogues. Dewey co-published at least two large Kellogg prints, Niagara and Its Wonders and Niagara Suspension Bridge, during the mid-1850s. Rufus Blanchard, who was a Chicago historian as well as a mapmaker and map publisher, co-published at least three Kellogg prints, including Old Fort Dearborn and Rebuilding Chicago, Oct. 1871. Carlos L. Golden and Thomas J. Sammons of Chicago were publishers of maps and charts and dealers in picture frames. They co-published several Kellogg prints, usually in combination with either George of F.P. Whiting. In 1867, Egbert B. Clark joined the firm, which then became Golden, Sammons & Co., and co-published a few additional prints. 20
“Notes by a Man about Town,” Hartford Daily Courant, Vol. 13 (January 18, 1849), p. 2. 21
David S. Kellogg kindly provided me with a photocopy of his copy of Charles Kellogg’s letters and diary. 22
On Kelloggs and clocks, see above, note 4. Actual Kellogg prints were apparently used as clock decorations only in the 1830s, but Charles’ suggestion that clockmakers were among the Kelloggs’ best customers seems to indicate an ongoing relationship. The Connecticut Historical Society has several large albums containing examples of printing done by the Kellogg & Bulkeley Company in the early 20
th century; these include numerous examples of lithographic clock faces.
Charles’s note implies that the Kelloggs may have been producing something of this kind at least as early as the mid-19
th century.
23 Probably James Thacher, American Revolution, from the Commencement to the Disbanding of
the American Army; given in the form of a daily journal (Hartford: Hurlbut, Williams & Co., 1862). An advertisement for the book, which appeared in the Hartford Daily Courant on November 28, 1861, stated that it was being sold “only by subscription” and that “the agent is now soliciting orders from out citizens, who will no doubt be glad of the opportunity of procuring a copy of this truly valuable book.” (p. 2) As early as October, Hurlbut, Williams & Co. were advertising for “100 Men, to engage in the sale of a work just ready, and suited to the times—one that Agents are now selling rapidly. Extra inducements offered to energetic, persevering men. Apply at the American Subscription Publishing House, No. 148 Asylum street, Hartford.” 24
The Connecticut Historical Society collection includes a few black-and-white Kellogg prints from the early 1840s. All later prints were either hand-colored, tinted, or, on occasion, printed in colors. The inexpensive popular prints Charles was selling in New Jersey would all have been colored by hand. 25Christopher W. Lane was the first to suggest the presence of Kellogg Civil War cartoons in contemporary taverns in his article, “The Kellogg Menagerie of Civil War Cartoons,” The Magazine Antiques, Vol. 170, No. 7 (July 2006), pp. 92-99. He later elaborated on this theme in a lecture at the Connecticut Historical Society. Charles Kellogg’s letter confirms that at least some Kellogg prints of this period were present in taverns and presumably visible to customers there. 26
Attack upon Fort Sumter is PVA 28. The three different prints of Bull Run, all entitled Battle of Bull’s Run, Va., July 21
st 1861 are PVA 47. 48 and 49.
27 See Nancy Finlay, “Representations of Children in the Lithographs of the Kellogg Brothers of
Hartford, Connecticut, 1830-1870,” in The Worlds of Children, 1620-1920. (Peter Benes, ed.) The Dublin Seminar for New England Folklife, Annual Proceedings 2002 (Boston: Boston University, 2004), pp. 130-147. 28
Charles Kellogg’s Civil War service is discussed in detail, and his Civil War diary is reproduced in Betty Cruser Kellogg, Those Who Came Before, Vol. 2: The Kellogg Family (West Vancouver, BC: privately published, 1999). Charles’ diary is included among the papers that he transcribed for his children. 29
Partnership contract, E.C. Kellogg papers, The Connecticut Historical Society. 30
The sample book was donated to the Connecticut Historical Society in 2007 by David S. Kellogg. 31The notice of the merger appeared in the Hartford Daily Courant, January 2, 1867, p. 8.
23
32
A complete list of the companies represented in the Sample Book is included as an appendix to this article. 33
“Interview with Mr. William Bulkeley by Doug Adams, October 16. 1974,” Douglas Adams Papers, Archives of American Art, Washington, D.C. 34
The earliest known large-folio print by the Kelloggs is Sag Harbor, (L.I.) N.Y. (PVA 809), which bears the imprint of D.W. Kellogg & Co. and can be securely dated to 1840 on the basis of the buildings that appear in the print. Since D.W. Kellogg became E.B. & E.C. Kellogg & Co. in 1840, the print cannot be later than 1840. Sag Harbor measures 39.8 x 62.5 cm. 35
36
John H. Bingham and William H. Dodd formed their partnership on May 1, 1860. John Bingham had been working as a lithographer in Hartford as early as 1854. The firm endured, with several name changes, until 1884. In the 1860s, the firm produced color lithographs of Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, and other prominent Civil War heroes. 37
According to Harry T. Peters (America on Stone, p. 169), Ehrgott, Forbriger & Co. were in business in Cincinnati from 1861 to 1869. In 1858 and 1859, the firm was Ehrgott & Forbriger. 38
See John Reps, Views and Viewmakers of Urban America: Lithographs of Towns and Cities in the United States and Canada, Notes on the Artists and Publishers, and a Union Catalog of their Work, 1825-1925 (Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press, 1984), No. 550 and pp. 215-216. In most cases, the artists whose city views were lithographed and printed by the Kelloggs also published the prints after their own work. 39
Reps No. 551. 40
Reps No. 552. 41
Reps, “Urban Viewmaking: Artists and Publishers of the American Scene” in Views and Viewmakers of Urban America, pp. 3-16. 42
Bachmann produced views of New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, the District of Columbia, Maryland, Louisiana, Kansas, and Wisconsin. Reps, p. 160. Whitefield produced views of New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Maine, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Minnesota, Quebec, and Ontario. Reps, p. 216. 43
Hartford Daily Courant, Vol. XXXV No. 270 (November 14, 1871), p. 2. 44
R.G. Dun & Co., Vol. 17362, Entry for August 4, 1873. 45
Ibid., Entries for July 15 and August 14, 1877. 46
In 1947, when the Kellogg & Bulkeley Company merged with Case, Lockwood & Brainard to form Connecticut Printers, Kellogg & Bulkeley still retained something of a separate identity and that imprint continued to appear on some types of printing. Connecticut Printers finally closed its doors on June 8, 1990. (Hartford Courant, May 30, 1990, p. F1). Two former employees of Connecticut Printers subsequently set up a shop with the same name that continued until September 28, 2000.
