[BABBITT, B.T. Benjamin Talbot]

[TRADE CARD] B.T. Babbitt’s Best Soap. “Soap for All Nations. Cleanliness is the scale of Civilization.”

New York: B.T. Babbitt, No date [before 1904]. Ephemera no binding. [ADVERTISING CARD]. The Hatch Litho Co., New York, printers. 4 ½” x 5 ¾”; stiff card stock; chromolithograph card front, lithographed text on rear; small closed tear to foot, light soiling and crease at right lower corner; very good minus. Very good. Item #1331

Pictorial card featuring the large manufacturing building for Babbitt’s Soap in New York City before their move in 1904 to North Bergen, New Jersey. The card has both of the company’s advertising slogans prominently placed above the pictorial of the manufacturing plant and surrounded on 3 sides by international views, the center view appearing to be Columbia holding aloft a bar of soap with an American flag draped on her lap, supported by an American eagle. The text on the verso advertises B.T. Babbitt’s Baby Soap and A Perfect Toilet Soap. Considered a genius of advertising, in 1851 B.T. Babbitt (1809-1889) was the first to manufacture and market soap in individual bars. A machinist, wheelwright and file maker by trade, he also designed the manufacturing equipment necessary to produce the soap that he sold. Perhaps unfairly, Sinclair Lewis is said to have modeled the title character of his novel, Babbitt, after B.T. Babbitt. website: Find-A-Grave (dot) com.

Price: $25.00