Beyond the South End

 

 

Do You Think

 You Could Buy an

Ad for our Yearbook?

 

 

This is the question many seniors on yearbook staffs are asking local businesses about now. Rockland, Maine has a long history of supporting educational programs and local schools. They often buy ads year after year, making it possible to print the yearbook for that year’s graduating class.

I don’t have my yearbook, The Cauldron, for 1959, however, I somehow managed to hang on to my mother’s. She graduated from Rockland High School in 1927. I will bring you more of the history of that issue of The Cauldron later on; but today I bring you some interesting facts as displayed by the advertising in that year’s issue of The Cauldron.

The ads in this yearbook for 1927 are indeed a microcosm of that era in Rockland’s history. I counted 104 ads in the book. Of those, I only recognize 18 that survived until 1959 when I graduated. Of those 18, only four still exist: The Courier Gazette, E.C.Moran, Huston-Tuttle, and the Thorndike.

You get a sense of how busy Main Street was at that time and how many different businesses co-existed in the business district. Of the 104, I counted 9 service stations or car dealerships; eight department/clothing stores; 3 druggists; 4 cleaners, clothes dyers and repairers; 5 financial institutions; 2 furniture stores; 2 book stores; 3 hardware stores; 3 stores selling sundries and newspapers; 9 food stores; 4 coal/fuel businesses; 1 dime store, 3 plumbing and heating contractors; 3 shoe stores; 3 jewelers; 3 restaurants/soda fountain; 2 grain companies. How did they all stay in business? The competition must have been fierce.

You don’t think of the late 20s as the horse and buggy days; however, there was one ad in the book that demonstrates the transition from one era to another. George M. Simmons at that time was a dealer in horses, tires, auto supplies, carriages, sleighs, robes, and even real estate. He was a busy man and obviously his business is morphing from one era of transportation to another. I expect the robes were carriage robes for those cold days.

I also saw a lot of ads for batteries. Exide batteries was one brand on sale. I’m guessing they are talking about car batteries. Was it that batteries didn’t last as long then? Maybe they didn’t have three and five year guarantees then.

The car dealers were interesting too. I saw cars that are no longer made and cars I never heard of. Snow-Hudson Co. sold used Packards, Hudsons, and Essexes. My brother had a Packard convertible at one time. I’ve heard of Hudsons but not the Essex. Jones Motor Co., on the Bicknell Block, sold 6 and 8 cylinder “motor cars.” E.O. Philbrook & Son, sold “fine motor cars” (Willys-Knight and Whippet). Did you ever hear of those cars?

I scanned some of the more interesting ads to share with you:

 

 

This page shows an ad from E.C. Moran & Co., an insurance company on Main Street. My mother was executive secretary to Mr. Moran and typed up his dictated autobiography (has anyone ever seen it?) Her two best friends, Audrey Teel and Dorothy Baxter, worked with her there. I believe my mother, Evangeline, went to work there right out of high school. Audrey and Dot worked there many years after my mother left to raise her family. I used to stop by and chat with them at the office often when I was home.

 

 

The top ad here for Chisholms’s advertises sodas and ices. Do you think that is an “ice” in the picture? I think the only place you can get an ice these days is in some neighborhoods of New York City. I guess they didn’t sell ice cream floats or the like then. Chisholm’s would have been my Humptey’s, where the gang always hung out in high school.

The middle ad shows The Courier-Gazette which boasted a circulation of 6,500; “85% of it in the district of which Rockland is the trading center.” The paper sold for $3.00/year at that time. You also see here the Boston Shoe Store, which I remember.

The bottom ad shows a logo for Rockland Coal Company. It points out to us an industry that has been morphed into oil companies these days. No one these days buys much coal, wood, ice, baled hay or straw. Along with the coal companies we can count the grain companies as mostly a thing of the past.

 

 

On this ad we see Senter Crane Company and Gregory’s, two stores I remember well. I like the Gregory ad which claims “You won’t find better suits in Serge or Unfinished Worsteds in single or double breasted than we show right here and now. Designed by the world’s Greatest Tailors. You’ll like the style, the fabric and the make. Everything necessary for a successful graduation.” Who words an ad like this anymore?

 

 

The name Perry is recognizable as being prominent in local business. Here are two of their businesses, Perry’s Foodland on Main Street; and M.B. & C.O. Perry, selling coal, wood, and coke also of Main Street. The class of 1927 graduated Evelyn Perry, who was vice-president of the class.

 

 

 

This ad for fuller-cobb-davis, a well known department store at that time, gave me a couple of chuckles. They appeal to the “summer colony” in Rockland and surrounding cities and towns. “Do you realize that we carry in stock the finest quality furs obtainable? July and August is the time to make your selections when we have our fur sale and the largest stock.” I assume they were after the more affluent clientele who visited in the summer. However, how many of them would read this ad in a student publication? They also offered some advice: “We suggest a night school for the boys and girls, men and women, who cannot and did not have a chance to graduate, of which there are many.”

 

 

 

This ad for The North National Bank is a full page ad for the back cover of the yearbook. Note they say: “A complete banking service conducted under the direct supervision of the….UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT.” They also claim to be a member of the Federal Reserve System. The Federal Reserve had only been in existence since 1913, 14 years before. People sometimes still didn’t trust banks so much.

 

 

 

This is another bank ad for Security Trust Company of Rockland, Camden, Vinalhaven, Union, and Warren. Do you like their story? “The staunch oak grows from the tiny acorn. From small beginnings great fortunes have grown. If we spend for the things we need and save money reasonably, we display the right sort of faith. We put value into our efforts when we manage to restrain our spending. A nation that saves reasonably gets the most for its money. So does an individual. Think it over. Long experience has given us some valuable information on proper saving. We are at all times ready to share our knowledge with you.” Condescending or what? Thank you Big Daddy Bank.

Of course 1927 was but two years away from the world’s Great Depression. Think they were trying to tell us something?

The bottom ad on this page also gave me a chuckle. Have you ever seen “Three Crow” brand spice ever in your life? It must have been a winner for the Atlantic Spice Co. and it was packed in “sanitary” moisture proof packages to boot. Well I sure hope so.

I know that The Cauldron no longer exists; but I assume the new high school does have a yearbook, whatever it’s called. I urge you, if you are a local business person or professional person such as a doctor or dentist, to help the kids get their yearbook printed. You never know. After reading this blog you might wonder that if your business survives until 2099, 86 years hence, you might still find a copy of a yearbook lying around, like I did, with your ad in it. People don’t throw their yearbooks out. Your ad in a newspaper will disappear the day after that issue hits the streets. If you buy an ad in a school yearbook, you become a part of the history of that era. Think about that.

Thanks for listening.