Collections: Ephemera ~ Paper Fans

Top left: "I'm someone's little child
please drive carefully" Painted by Mabel Rollins Harris, who was active in the 20's and 30's. The picture shows a young girl eyeing a robin on her nest, surrounded by automobile safety rules. The reverse is an ad for Chevrolet, especially touting the safety features found in Chevy autos, by J.W. Hollowell & Son in Federalsburg, MD. I love the one that says "keep yourself physically fit and mentally alert"!

Middle: Painted by Charles Mark Relyea (1863-1932), the scene is a campfire beside a lake on a full-moonlit night, and the men are dipping snuff - W.E. Garrett Snuff - Man's Best Chew! Note the canoe at the edge of the lake and the moose standing on a spit. It appears that the man standing up is reaching for his rifle....Surely he wouldn't shoot the moose, would he? Garrett's Snuff was made in "the largest snuff factory in the world" in Memphis, TN. It was called Scotch snuff, according to the story, that a merchant in Ireland had some snuff in stone jars exposed to the heat of a fire on his premises, and as he could not afford to throw it away he sold it to his patrons without mentioning that it had been scorched by fire. Much to his surprise, his patrons began to demand more of that scorched snuff....and the name was confused....and it became "Scotch". The calendar at the top is dated 1936, and so the company must have appropriated the Relyea painting for the fan after the artist's death.

Bottom: a photograph of two small children, with their cocker spaniel, saying grace over their dessert table. The rear advertises Arthur Foust's Atlantic Service Station, 702 E. Market St., Greensboro, NC, Phone 9443. Their motto: "Our Service is Measured by Satisfied Customers".