Mississippi Pictorial Broadside (or original shipping box wrapper) for a Dry Goods Merchant
With Caricatured Depictions of African Americans
The main engraving on this sheet depicts about a dozen potential customers observing a large billboard-like sign being assembled by a group of workmen and boys. The sign reads "The Best Boots & Shoes." The group of onlookers includes men (one on horseback), a woman and child, and an African American man and child.
The varied typography is notable, as it incorporates five or six different typefaces.
A. W. Morse has adopted a charming owl as his logo, which is prominently depicted in the present broadside.
The only Enterprise, Mississippi we can locate is in Clark County and has never had more than 1000 people. In fact population seems to have peaked in 1910 with 877 residents.
While this sheet can be described as a pictorial broadside advertisement, the thin stock of the paper and the fold over flaps suggest that it may have originally been used as a box or crate wrapper. Regardless of whether it was a broadside or a box wrapper, it stands as a wonderful survivor of a decidedly ephemeral production from a tiny Mississippi village.