27. February 2023
This beautiful mid-1920s Art Deco style advertisement sign for Allenburys tells the astonishing story of the once wealthiest foreign family of Old Shanghai. They were highly esteemed, with numerous schools, two streets, an office building, and even a coffee house named after them. Yet, their name has almost been forgotten, if it weren’t for the rare artefacts that sometimes still show up in the antique markets and the few remnants of their legacy strewn across the vanishing old city.
23. January 2023
Happy Chinese New Year! This rare A.S. Watsons advertisement from our collection not only has a peculiar design around the auspicious character 康 (health), but tells the origin story and evolution of the famous Chinese calendar posters which were in fact pioneered by Watsons in the 1880s together with a second British firm.
05. December 2022
The crumb trail of Bakerite leads us back to the American James David Sullivan, who after serving in the Spanish American War, came to China at the turn of the century and established the Denniston & Sullivan photo supplies store on Broadway (today’s Daming Rd.) in the Shanghai International Settlement. In June 1906 Sullivan sold the business to former employees Messrs. L.L. Hopkins and J.J. Gilmore who continued to operate it but moved it to Nanking Rd. (todays Nanjing East Rd.)
28. October 2022
This large 1932 map of Shanghai was produced by Millington Inc., one of the “Big 4” advertising agencies of old Shanghai. It was issued in the same year when Millington also started to produce the monthly “The Cathay” hotel magazine and features almost the same advertisers. The map was a supplement to the “City Directory of Shanghai”, a publication issued by Millington and which complemented the “Rosenstock’s Business Directory of China” which the agency also produced annually...
22. July 2022
Probably our favorite panorama of Old Shanghai from our collection: an illustration from Harpers Weekly, September 12, 1900. Also an amazing reminder on how developed both the Bund on the Puxi side, as well as the Pudong side were already at that time. From a viewpoint most likely on top of the American Cigarette Company Co factory, on the Pudong side, we can see the building of the British Cigarette Company Ltd to the left (BAT was only established in 1902), on the right the Pootung Hotel, the...
22. June 2022
If you’ve read Paul French‘s excellent book City of Devils you of course heard of famous Shanghai slot machine king “Jack” E.T. Riley. Jack was known to have been a longtime supporter of the Marines, and they in turn helped save his butt more than once. What, to our knowledge, previously was not known is that before joining spirits merchant Gande, Price & Co in late 1933 (where his “commercial record was above reproach”), Jack gave it a shot on his own to distribute U.B.C. –...
13. December 2021
American Express was started in 1850 as an express mail business in Buffalo, New York. In 1857, the company started its expansion in the area of financial services by launching a money order business to compete with the United States Post Office's money orders. The American Express Traveler's Cheques were launched in 1891 and established American Express as a truly international company. It also acted as passenger agency for all type of bookings including for tourist trips such as with hotel...
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