Fin..
Frat..

Ger

Groc

Pioneers and Leaders.

THE age of a business concern is most surely an evidence of its respectability, and its permanence, progress and prosperity equally an assurance of its usefulness. If it is of long standing, if its career has been one of success, and it has been constantly enlarging the sphere of its operations, the fact is palpable that it must have fully met the requirements of the interests it was created to serve.

enter

Moreover, if during its career it has distanced similar contemporaneously established prises and attained leadership among keen and active competitors, it has asserted a claim to confidence in its value as a business institution serving the public, such as no other quality or experience can supply.

Pettingill & Co., the oldest Newspaper Advertising Agency in the United States, is a house of this kind. It can be fairly said that its history is the history of advertising in this country, and its list of customers and volume of business probably entitle it to first place among advertising agencies today.

V. P. Palmer was the first advertising agent. He began in 1841 in the old Scollay Building, Scollay Square, Boston, and founded the business to which one of his clerks, S. R. Niles, succeeded. Another of his clerks was S. M. Pettingill, who concluded in 1849 that there was room for another agency, and forthwith established one. His first customer failed and left him involved to the extent of $2,000; but this did not dishearten the new "firm," which persevered and rapidly built up a substantial business in conservative old Boston, earning the respect and confidence of its solid merchants.

Mr. S. M. Pettingill started his New York branch in 1852.

One of the first customers secured in New York by Mr. Pettingill was Robert Bonner. His first contract was for $1,000, and he gravely questioned the wisdom of undertaking it, as the amount was more than he could hope to pay, unless the results brought him the money to do it. Afterwards he made one contract for $100,000 with much less hesitancy.

The

A distinguishing characteristic of Pettingill & Co. has been their ability to keep their customers. Very rarely have they lost one that it was desirable to retain. first advertising ever done by Dr. Wilbor, the proprietor of Wilbor's Cod Liver Oil, was done by this house in 1850, and up to the time of Dr. Wilbor's death, which

done for the proprietors of Hoyt's German Cologne and Rubifoam was placed by Pettingill & Co., which has continued to place all of the advertising of the firm up to this time. Vegetine was advertised in the seventies by this house. Hunt's Remedy was another old-time medicine made famous by this agency, and Dr. Greene's Nervura, now so celebrated, was built up largely by newspaper work done through Pettingill & Co.

The

Curtis Davis & Co., makers of Welcome Soap, have for years employed this agency, as have Chase & Sanborn, the great Seal Brand Coffee merchants. methods of Pettingill & Co., as applied to the Lydia E. Pinkham Medicine Co., are responsible for the great success of its newspaper advertising. For many years the John P. Lovell Arms Co.'s firearms and bicycles have been advertised solely through Pettingill & Co. Bon Ami, the "modern cleaner," has always been advertised through this house. Ivorine, built up by newspaper advertising, owes its prominence also to the work of this agency, and the same can be said of Comfort Powder and Williams'

Root Beer.

The Pope Manufacturing Company, makers of Columbia Bicycles, have placed their advertising with Pettingill & Co. after years of experimenting, and they profess to be better pleased than ever before with the work and its results. Carter's Little Liver Pills were formerly advertised direct by the proprietor, a man of ability and great experience in advertising. For several years he has employed Pettingill & Co. to place business for him. Beardsley's Shredded Codfish was advertised into prominence by this agency. Wood, Bishop & Co., Stoves, Bangor, Me., is another of the old customers who continue to employ Pettingill & Co., as are also J. H. W. Huckins & Co., makers of Huckins' Soups, the Gurney Heater Manufacturing Company, Seth W. Fowle & Sons, makers of Wistar's Balsam of Wild Cherry, A. P. Bush & Co., agents, Bovinine, and Buchanan & Lyall, of B-L Tobacco fame. Some of the many other commodities

and firms advertised through the work of this agency are Londonderry Lithia Water, Mellin's Food, the Kickapoo Indian Remedies, "Vim" Tires, "P. B." Ale, E. Howard Cycles, Queen Sherbet, Moxie, Bowker's Fertilizer, Stickney & Poor, Loring & Co., H. H. Carter, Bemis' Eye Sanitarium, Adamson's Cough Balsam, Angier's Petroleum Emulsion, Warwick Cycles, Sterling Ale, Regal Shoes, Lablanche Face Powder, Lowney's Chocolate Bonbons, "H-O," Glenwood Ranges, Heywood Shoes, Kozy Camera, Baird-North Company, L. P. Hollander & Co., United States Rubber Company, Edison Electric Illuminating Company, Youth's Companion, Worcester Salt, Emerson Shoes, the total amounting to millions of expenditure annually.

Some brief allusion to the present personality of a firm so conspicuous and of such long standing is not only pardonable, but must undoubtedly be of interest generally; its members are Mr. Ubert K. Pettingill and Mr. James T. Wetherald.

Mr. Ubert K. Pettingill has been senior member of the firm of Pettingill & Co. since the death of his father, Ubert L. Pettingill, in 1883. The financiering of a business like that of this house is enough to absorb the entire time and strength of one man, but Mr. Pettingill always finds time to oversee the various departments of the business and to keep in touch with their work. The preparation of the Newspaper Directory, published by the house, is his special care, and last, but not least, he personally attends to the great output of advertising for Dr. Greene's Nervura, which is in itself a vast enterprise requiring especial oversight and supervision. Mr. Pettingill possesses a genial and approachable personality, and enjoys the unqualified respect of his associates and the business community. He has for some years been one of the directors of the

Mechanics National Bank of Boston.

Mr. J. T. Wetherald became connected with the house of Pettingill & Co. in 1884. He was admitted to partnership in 1888. One of his first clients was Curtis Davis & Co., makers of Welcome Soap, and the John P. Lovell Arms Co. was another. E. W. Hoyt & Co., of German Cologne and Rubifoam reputation, and Chase & Sanborn were others, and Lydia E. Pinkham Vegetable Compound found in him a promoter who has