H. Jacobi, printer's sample for the World's Inventors souvenir album (A25) for Allen & Ginter Cigarettes

Art Historical Context

This charming printer's sample, titledH. Jacobi* (A25), comes from Allen & Ginter's *World's Inventors* souvenir album of 1888. Produced a commercial color lithograph this tiny portrait (just 2¾ x 1½ inches) captures the likeness of inventor H. Jacobi amid the Gilded Age's explosion of innovation. Allen & Ginter, pioneering American tobacco magnates, inserted such cards into cigarette packs as free promotional collectibles, sparking a craze for trading and scrapbooking. Chromolithography, the era's breakthrough technique for vibrant, mass-produced color printing, shines here in its precise layering of hues to evoke Jacobi's dignified features. These ephemera were more than ads—they celebrated industrial heroes, reflecting America's obsession with progress during the Second Industrial Revolution. Part of The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Jefferson R. Burdick Collection, this piece highlights how everyday commerce fueled popular culture. Today, it reminds us of trading cards' origins, bridging 19th-century marketing with modern hobbies like baseball cards. A delightful glimpse into Victorian ingenuity!

About the Artist

Allen & Ginter

Allen & Ginter, the pioneering American tobacco firm based in Richmond, Virginia, emerged around 1880 from the partnership of John F. Allen and Lewis Ginter, evolving from Allen's earlier John F. Allen & Company. Allen retired in 1882, succeeded by John Pope, yet the brand endured under Ginter's leadership, employing over 1,100 workers—mostly women—for hand-rolled cigarettes by 1886. Ginter, a Dut...