The receipts looked like nothing more than fountain-pen scribbles on a sheet. Looking closer, though, I could read the names of some of the products that were sold by this wholesaler in 1900.
I love finding these old grocery receipts because of the history they hold and the stories they tell about what we ate way back then, what was popular and how much we paid (some paying more than others).
At auction recently, I came across several receipts from B.S. Janney Jr. & Co. in Philadelphia – “Wholesale Grocers, Importers and Coffee Roasters.” Janney appears to have been the largest wholesale grocer in the city, with its multi-story building that bore three street numbers – 119, 121, 123. An 1898 newspaper obituary for the owner noted that he had been a wholesale grocer for nearly 60 years.
Janney sold its products for cash only. And in this case, the products were sold to J.S. Geller of Lansdale, PA, a town just northwest of Philadelphia. The company’s owner, Jacob S. Geller, owned Geller’s Grand Emporium, described in the town history as “Lansdale’s answer to a department store,” and its largest retailer.
The emporium carried anything a customer wanted, including food, clothing, toys, tools, furniture, real estate, and even caskets, along with funeral services. “If he didn’t have it, he’d get it,” according to the town history.
Geller was the big time in a small town. In most places around the country, grocery stores were more modest. Most consisted of no more than one sales room where customers would ask for or point to items behind a counter, or hand over a list of items they wanted to buy.
Piggly Wiggly was the first self-service grocery in the country, opening in Memphis, TN, in 1916. This new brand of store allowed people to choose products on their own. The founder, Clarence Saunders, placed certain items near the checkout to entice buyers, and his store introduced shopping baskets and open shelves. This new concept sparked a drop in grocery prices, as well as a rise in competition.
By the 1920s, chain stores began sprouting in small towns. A&P, which had been selling groceries in towns since the 1850s, took on the role as a national chain. The first real supermarket was credited to a man named Michael Kullen. In 1930 in Jamaica, Queens, NY, he converted a large garage into a retail store that sold national products.
Here are some of the groceries that the Geller store picked up at Janney’s over several months in 1900, giving us a good idea of what folks were eating and using. Fountain pens seemed to be the writing instrument of choice, and some of the cursive writing on the receipts is indecipherable:
On July 17, Geller bought starch, Gold Dust soap (washing powder), corn, search lights, Mother’s oats, Deerhead salmon, Rose vanilla pudding, Hires extract, pudding, mackerel, jam, Trenton crackers, straw papers and iced jumbles cookies.
On July 24, the grocer bought corned beef, soda crackers, lard, vanilla wafers, Hires root beer, Eagle butter, Honey jumbles cookies, currant fruits, spiced wafers, corn starch and malt breakfast food.
Geller was back on Sept. 17 to buy more lard, Walker’s soap (powder), coffee, soda, Baker’s chocolate, sardines, beans and oats.
On Dec. 13, Geller bought citron, salt, berries, Babbitts soap, seedless raisins, Lucky Strikes (likely chewing tobacco) and peas.
