So, some folks got up this last weekend, before the sun, and stood in long lines outside stores, hoping for a great deal. Big screen TV? New smart phone? Clothes for the children who will grow out of them before the next “Black Friday?” In America, we are bombarded with advertisements that invite us to pick up “stuff we need.” Today is no exception to that, either.

I loved that during my recent research on a family living in Syracuse, New York, I came across a gem that reflects the marketing culture of the 1880s in Syracuse. Likely printed to fill space left over after the “real news” was typeset and ready for press, this small advertisement was given at the bottom of the page. You can even see the deterioration of the bottom of the page before it was microfilmed, many years later.

It reads: A father who has the habit of buying candy for his wife and daughters will never lack popularity in his own come [sic, home] circle. HERALD ADVERTISING will tell you what kind of candy to buy.

Ad targeted at the fathers of the 1880s in New York

There is no shortage of subtle nuances in newspapers and other historical documents that frame the lives of our ancestors. In a city the size of Syracuse, fueled by a manufacturing boom after the Civil War, these hard-working men from the factory were invited to buy candy for their wives and daughters. Newspapers aren’t the only source of this kind of peripheral glimpse of your ancestor’s life: I recently found an advertisement for the tin smith shop my ancestor owned in an 1880s city directory. It gave me the address of his shop, and more detail about his specific skills in the trade than I was going to find in the alphabetical pages of the directory. Certainly this is priceless for my family.

This time of year, as you are bustling about, what gifts would your ancestors have sought out for their family members and friends? Depending on the time period, they were not strangers to advertising.