The four cardboard boxes were so small that they almost disappeared among the large items on the auction table. You had to squint to read the writing on them, but I knew what they were without having to do that.
A couple years ago, I had found one of those tiny boxes among some items in a box lot. It had a painting of a 19th-century woman in color on the cover, and I had no idea what something smaller than my thumb could have held. Inside the top cover was a very surprising answer: Hair Jewelry, printed in gold leaf.
A woman named Madame K. Schmitt of Philadelphia had used it to hold jewelry made from human hair. I learned that human-hair jewelry was the rave during the Victorian period, and Ms. Schmitt was one of its most popular purveyors.
The dainty boxes at the auction likely contained traditional jewelry. (One of the boxes, though, was from a Harrisburg, PA, druggist, and it had held “compressed pepsin,” as someone had written in pencil on the front of the box. It probably held tablets.)
The boxes were from various cities and countries. Because of that, I could only assume that they were part of someone’s collection and not from their personal use.
Bailey & Kitchen, Jeweller, Philada (an early abbreviation of the city)
This company was a predecessor to an upscale jewelry store in Philadelphia: Bailey, Banks & Biddle. It was founded in 1832 by Joseph Trowbridge Bailey and Andrew B. Kitchen as Bailey and Kitchen, then became Bailey & Co. before three jewelers in 1878 combined their operations into Bailey, Banks & Biddle.
Several sites repeated a story of the company creating a one-cent coin for the Southern confederacy. The story goes that in 1860, a company engraver made 12 samples of the penny, but hid them in a cellar after the country became engaged in a full-scale war. He was fearful that the Union government would learn of his making coins for the dissident Southerners. He apparently kept one coin for himself, which he used to pay for a drink in a bar. After then, the coins became public.
A more detailed version of the story, along with the history of Confederate coins during the Civil War, can be found on the American Numismatics Association website. One book, however, questioned whether this ever happened.
The company designed the final version of the Great Seal of the United States in 1904. It also manufactured the Congressional Medal of Honor, the first 40,000 Purple Hearts and the first two Distinguished Flying Crosses (one of which went to Charles Lindbergh.)
In the 1960s, Bailey, Banks & Biddle was acquired by Zales jewelry company, which eventually sold it to a company that later auctioned it off along with its other assets. The company continues to operate under new ownership.
Fournisseur de la Cour, H. Fuld, Joualier, Scheveningue, Kurhaus, (Hollande)
All I could do here was to use the Google Translator to translate the wording on the cover: Supplier of the court, H. Fuld, Jeweler, Scheveningue, Kurhaus (Netherlands).
Josef Hofel, Juwelier, Innsbruck
Josef Hofel was a 19th-century German jeweler. He left the business to his son Bernard. The father apparently amassed a large art collection that he also bequeathed to his son.
These paper advertising boxes seemed to be meant for carrying jewelry home to be stored in a more refined box, such as a jewelry casket or other small boxes made for that purpose. The most recognizable jewelry box is Tiffany’s, which was first used by Charles Louis Tiffany in 1886 and held an engagement ring.
