1864 Advertising Cover & Letter

For those of you who like advertising covers:



The upper left hand corner of the letter is embossed with the word Congress, and there is a line of stars under it. I can't decipher the writing; was Congress ordering something?

Beautiful! I may actually own one of those machines. I'll go down into the barn later and take a pic of it if I can find it. I inherited a bunch of real old timey farm implements with my farm. It used to be an old hemp farm (yes hemp) then a tobacco farm, wheat and finally corn in the 40's. I own a lot of old wooden stuff and very old farm equipment and looks familiar to me. I'll look for you.

Great cover. The fact that the letter has 'Congress' embossed on it may explain why there's no postage. That old government perk called 'franking'?

Love the picture. That old mower must have had quite a time cutting grass uphill like that!

Strange. It shouldn't receive a free franking privilege as it's from a private company. Could the embossed "Congress" actually be the name of the company that manufactured the envelope ?

Beautiful cover alright.

I also notice that the address is also in NY. While it is a large city, even back then by standards of the day, is there a possibility that the letter could have simply been 'dropped off' and hence, no postage applied?? Some employee of the company may have had to do that as part of his job description to drop letters etc off personally within a certain distance?? Save the company postage costs <G>. Just a wild guess really.

Chimo

Bujutsu