The newspaper I chose to read was August 8th 1894's edition of the Birmingham Age-Herald. To be honest I skimmed a few random ones pretty quickly and just settled on this one. I found the advertisements to be particularly interesting, especially since the prices and products were so different. One thing I did notice across several different states newspapers is the amount of advertisements for Castoria, a "harmless substitute for Paregoric, drops, soothing syrups, and castor oil". They make it very clear every time that it does not contain opium or morphine, as we all know back then people did not know the side effects to these drugs, putting them in several medicines available anywhere. It is advertised to "prevent vomiting sour curd, cures diarrhea and wind colic". This was actually pretty funny to read, as Castoria today is a laxative which you can still buy today. The sheer amount of ads for baking powder in the few papers I read (some even having 2 or 3 a page) was also interesting, as many people in the late 1800's and early 1900's made their own bread.
One thing I did notice was who the advertisements were aimed towards. Almost every single ad in the newspapers I read were directed towards men and men's needs, while the only time anything was directed towards women was cooking or occasionally dress related. Many clothing stores advertising all sorts of stock only list mens and boys clothes, and while some stores only sell menswear even today, I find it heard to believe that no stores sold womens clothes whatsoever. In this particular paper, the only ads directed towards women readers were found in the very back of the paper, totally separated from anything important. Most were for women only colleges, and one for hair care. The rest were all more for banks and men's clothing. While I understand times were different back then, I couldn't help but notice that this seemed pretty sexist. It does make sense that the mens ads were with all of the important news for the time, as women in the United States could not vote until 26 years after this issue was released. The late 1800's were a very different time, and it really helps to show just how far we have come since then.
Hi Crighton,
ReplyDeleteVery nice Blog, you explained thoroughly the articles and also the articles you read seemed to be very interesting. We can notice a big difference between newspapers back then and now. When I was skimming throught he newspapers to be honest I chose the one that was most attractive in terms of visualization. I think marketing wasn't a big thing back then and newspapers that used to have imagery and nice constructed title were more attractive to read then others. Another point that it seems like both of us noticed is the way the articles were written about a certain audience such as males and only some ads int he very back where could be some things for women to read.