THE MAGIC OF ADVERTS (2)
LAST week we considered printed advertisements as historical documents that convey a sense of the past.
During the 1890s, newspapers carried cramped announcements that were difficult to read, but those who could afford to buy periodicals and guide books were treated to eye-catching full or half-page adverts using varied type-faces and elegant embellishments.
William Duncan & Co were drapers, hosiers, dressmakers, milliners and carpet warehousemen whose pure woollen undergarments were unequalled for health, comfort and value.
They also stocked the latest novelties “from the home markets”, by which they meant Britain.
Dr CF Juritz & Co were chemists and druggists at the Angel Dispensary in Loop Street. They manufactured and supplied Dutch medicines and the remedies that farmers’ wives stocked in their medicine chests or “Huis-Apotheke”, which were used to treat their families and servants for every affliction, great or small.
A century before South African labour-brokers came under the spotlight, Mrs Clegg started a servants’ agency in Shortmarket Street. This was at a time when young middle-class white women were starting to enter the job market instead of helping to run the family boarding house or staying dutifully at home.
Most aspired to become teachers, clerks and telephonists rather than nurses, who were exposed to the brutal realities of life and death.
Mrs Clegg’s agency might have been a bold move in the direction of independence, but its unlikely to have improved her social standing. She placed adverts in English and Dutch in the guide for 1891 which illustrate the unequal “madam and maid” dynamics of the time:
“Families requiring servants for town or country should give their orders to Mrs Clegg, who sends servants to all parts of the Colony, Natal, Transvaal, Orange Free State, Basutoland, Mashonaland, etc., under personal supervision.
“Servants, white and coloured, are invited to apply to Mrs Clegg, who always has comfortable homes with good wages to offer. Nothing to pay, only good character and ability required.”
Advertisements for schools seem quaint today. The lady principal of Sea Point High School for Girls offered pupils a high class education, special musical advantages, careful moral training, sea bathing (printed in capitals), a healthy situation, home comforts and an unlimited diet.
The school had kindergarten, intermediate and senior departments and also trained teachers.
Haddon House, a day and boarding school in Mowbray, taught the usual subjects on lines identical with those in German and English schools. It also offered a special commercial course, including shorthand, to boys “who are about to enter at the desk” (in other words, become clerks in business or government service). Writing and spelling would receive special attention.
The English principal, F LintonJones, was prepared to accommodate “backward and delicate” boys, promising to bestow the greatest pains and care upon them. Whether their more robust classmates were equally kind and considerate is another matter.