A collection containing more than one thousand textile swatches, most dated 1863 or 1872, plus some other miscellaneous documents which relate to textiles, 1833-1874. The swatches include stripes, solids, and floral and geometric prints, ranging in size from thumbnail size to a piece that is 19 inches by 36 inches. Many of the swatches are associated with the Ancona Printing Co. of Gloucester City, New Jersey; the notes attached to these swatches were addressed to the company's manager Archibald M. Graham, are dated 1872, and were possibly written by David S. Brown, the owner of the company. The 1863 designs may have been from one of Brown's other textile mills. The collection includes three different sets of swatches that came with wrappers around them. One of the wrappers was labeled E. Potter & Co., but the other wrappers were not marked. (Two other wrappers were found loose, but it was impossible to determine what fabrics they once included.). As well, the collection contains other documents related to textiles. More than a dozen watercolors are designs for printed fabrics; included with these are several samples of hand colored designs on top of printed fabrics. There are two printed labels for fabrics, one for Downright Gingham, manufactured by David S. Brown, and the other a colored label for Laurel Lake Cottons. This label depicts an Indian woman paddling a canoe, with tepees and mountains in the background. Among the miscellaneous bills and correspondence about textiles is a letter from Mrs. Reverdy Johnson of Maryland, to Catherine Lawson, a milliner in New York, to which Mrs. Johnson has pinned a swatch of the fabric for which she desires a matching hat. There are two price lists, a blank, undated list from Philadelphia, listing such fabrics as Waltham shirtings, Lancaster sheetings, and other fabrics from Dover, Blackstone, Coventry, Georgia, Providence M. Co., Dorchester, United M. Co., Samuel Slater's plaids and stripes, woolens (cloth, cassimeres, satinets, flannels, and bockings), and Philadelphia Weaver's Goods, including Wilmington stripes, tickings, denims, and cords. The list also provides space for the prices of different kinds of wool and raw cotton (Sea Island, Louisiana, Alabama, Upland, Tennessee, and Roanoke), indigo, linseed oil, flour, grain, and starch. The other price list, for 1853 and 1854, is from Manchester, England, and lists prices for yarn, and for grey, white, and turkey-red goods. Other items in the collection document activities as follows: the Leeds, England, firm of Titley, Tathams & Walker shipped thread to Philadelphia in 1833 and 1874. Two shipping receipts show that table cloths and other linen fabrics were imported from Belfast, Ireland, by Philadelphia merchants. In 1843, Eckel, Spangler, & Raiguel of Philadelphia sold a large variety of textiles and clothing accessories to Fry & Rambo, including flannel, gingham, net, edging, lace, lawn, ribbons, bandanas, stocks, silk cord, table cloths, buttons, alpaca, drilling, cassimere, and other goods. In 1856, David S. Brown purchased goods from the American Print Works, the items being shipped from Fall River, Massachusetts. The American Print Works was still in business in 1875, as evidenced by an advertising postcard. A document filed by the Eddystone Manufacturing Co. of Chester, Pennsylvania, with its insurance company includes a drawing of the buildings and two diagrams indicating the placement of the different departments, such as the dye house, steaming house, bleaching room, engraved rolls storage room, etc. The document also includes a description of the various buildings and lists fire appliances. These documents are stamped with the date March 9, 1885.
