Waltham Time in New York: A Robbins & Appleton Letter
H. A. Robbins of Robbins & Appleton, New York agents for the American Watch Co. of Waltham, asks a Charleston firm to mail him back his bonds and mortgage.
TranscriptionThe letter
OFFICE OF ROBBINS & APPLETON, Waltham Building, 1 BOND STREET, Agents for the American Watch Co., Waltham, Mass.
Receiving stampRUTLEDGE & YOUNG'S OCT 11 1873 CHARLESTON S.C.
HandwrittenNew York, Oct 9 1873 Mess. Rutledge & Young Charleston S.C. Gents Will you please send me by mail the bonds and mortgages you hold of mine, and oblige Yours very truly H A Robbins
The story on the paper
The American Watch Company of Waltham was the first corporation in America to make watches on production lines, and its timepieces spread across the country through agents in the big cities. Robbins & Appleton, whose printed letterhead sits at the top of this page, were the Waltham company's New York agents, headquartered at 1 Bond Street in a grand cast-iron building that still stands.
The letter itself is a one-sentence piece of business: Robbins asks the Charleston, South Carolina firm of Rutledge & Young to "send me by mail the bonds and mortgages you hold of mine." But the small paper records two worlds. New York finance in the months before the Panic of 1873, when Robbins wanted his securities close at hand, and Charleston in early Reconstruction, five years after the war, when a northernman's agent could mail a request south and expect it received on October 11, per the blue receiving stamp.
The ink bleeding through from the back shows the letter was folded for its own use, carried, and filed.
The people named in it
H. A. Robbins
New York partner of Robbins & Appleton, sales agents for the American Watch Co. of Waltham, whose Waltham Building at 1 Bond Street he occupied.
- Type
- Business letter on letterhead
- Date
- New York, October 9, 1873
- Place
- New York, New York