Object of the Day: A Trade Card for Sewing Machines

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Because cupid wants to sew you into your dress, that’s why.

What have we here? Yes, it’s another trade card. American, dating to the early Twentieth Century, this card advertises Singer Sewing Machines. The obverse depicts a rather demented looking putto sewing the court train of a woman’s wedding dress—just as she’s about the walk down the aisle, it seems. Faintly written above the cupid are the words:

WHAT I HAVE SEWED
TOGETHER, LET NO MAN
RIP ASUNDER. 

Bride and groom both look slightly disoriented.

The reverse of the card has the typical, confusingly vague and overly dramatic ad copy.

It reads:

Some Very hard Nuts to Crack 

1 

     Companies have sprung up in every part of
the Union for making an “Imitation Singer
Machine.” 
     WHY ARE NOT SIMILAR COMPANIES FORMED
FOR MAKING IMITATIONS OF OTHER SEWING
MACHINES?
     The public will draw its own inference. GOLD
IS CONTINUALLY COUNTERFIETED; BRASS AND
TIN NEVER!

2 

     The Singer has taken the FIRST PRIZE over
ALL competitors more than TWO HUNDRED TIMES.
Why? 

3 

    After the Chicago Fire, the Relief Committee
Undertook to furnish sewing machines to the needy
Women of that city. Applicants were permitted to
Chose From sixteen different kinds of machines.
2,944 applicants were furnished with machines. 

          2.427 chose SINGER MACHINES
                235   “   Wheeler & Wilson
                   127   “   Howe 

                       30 “   Wileox & Gibbs
                          5 “   Wilson
                          2 “   Davis 

118 distributed their choice among TEN other 
kinds of machines. 

These girls were to EARN THEIR LIVING on these
machines. Why did they take Singers? 

THE SINGER MANUFACTURING CO.