Ashby & Egner Wholesale Philadelphia Store Note... Advertisement??/

PROMETHIUS88

Picked this up because I thought it was interesting. It is not dated but appears possibly from the Civil War era. I'm not sure if this is considered just an advertisement piece or what? Paper is the same texture as banknotes from that era.
I have tried to do some reasearc on "Ashby & Egner" but couldn't come up with anything. Also appears that the SE corner of Market and 4th was a price selling area until around 1870 when things were moved to make way for a railroad.
Can anyone shed any light on this piece??

Steve_in_Tampa

Quite unusual, that’s for sure.
It received plenty of circulation for an advertising piece with no perceived value. I do like the engravings and can see why someone would keep it, valueless or not. It looks like money.

sellitstore

It's an advertising note and a pretty scarce and early one. I don't recall seeing one of these previously. Yours appears to grade a respectable and collectible fine.

Bob Vlack list a similar note as #3605 in his catalog "An Illustrated Catalog of Early North American Advertising Notes". His note differs from yours as it shows "Ashby & Rocap" as the merchant. Otherwise, the design is exactly the same. They were hatters in Philadelphia listed in the 1855 directory. We don't know if Egner was a previous or later partner, but this note is likely from the 1850s. Vlack shows values of $40 in fine and $75 in XF but those values are low. Two to three times those numbers are probably fair retail values now. Some of Vlack's values were low at the time of publication (2001) and are lower today.

PROMETHIUS88

@sellitstore said:
It's an advertising note and a pretty scarce and early one. I don't recall seeing one of these previously. Yours appears to grade a respectable and collectible fine.

Bob Vlack list a similar note as #3605 in his catalog "An Illustrated Catalog of Early North American Advertising Notes". His note differs from yours as it shows "Ashby & Rocap" as the merchant. Otherwise, the design is exactly the same. They were hatters in Philadelphia listed in the 1855 directory. We don't know if Egner was a previous or later partner, but this note is likely from the 1850s. Vlack shows values of $40 in fine and $75 in XF but those values are low. Two to three times those numbers are probably fair retail values now. Some of Vlack's values were low at the time of publication (2001) and are lower today.

Thank you for the valuable info! Sorry for my delayed response. We had some really bad storms last Thursday and our power finally was restored today. Quite the adventure, to say the least.

I wasn't aware that there was a catalog for these notes. I will have to look into it. Nice to know there is some documentation at least on something similar. I guess it wasn't a bad pickup for $15.

sellitstore

It's rare and the condition is decent. For $15, it was quite a good deal.

I'd hesitate to call it "unique" but R6 (6-10 known) or R7 (1-5 known) seems likely.