A girl from NJ used to come over to use my washer/dryer and do crafts down cellar.
She would pick up large framed pictures for a buck or two at garage sales for the frames.I went to move one yesterday and it fell apart from moisture damage. The wood had swollen so the joints let go and the fancy plaster work fell off. I don’t even remember what the picture was, not a photograph a black on white print, yard sale crap. Between the print and the thin wood backing was two sheets of newspaper trimmed to about 14” by 20” so the edges where the name would be were gone, but a Philly paper from February, 1900.
Carrying it upstairs and reading both side virtually destroyed them both.



For anyone wanting to place an ad and couldn’t make it to the main office they could drop it at a branch office for the same price. It listed the address of  3 in Camden NJ, 1 in Norristown, and 99 in Philly. The "branch offices" were mostly Apothecaries, American District Telegraph, or Western Union locations.
 
Lists of ships arrived in or sailed from Philly and NY, plus ships scheduled to arrive or sail.
Cargo arrived in Philly, and cargo with value shipped from Philly.
353 bales hog hair  $2761.30 headed for Glasgow on British steamer Corean.
100 casks Arsenic from Hamburg via Boston on the German steamer Adria.
Philly Post Office listed the countries they had received mail from.
 
In Media, PA, Pinney Pierce and his brother Jim who were locked up for killing George B Eyre, were in a good mood because family was allowed to visit on Friday. Meanwhile the Wilmington, DE, police were trying to find the woman who claimed Pinney tried to sell her Eyre’s ring.
 
NY stock and bonds, agriculture reports, loans on household goods without removal (making sure you’re anchored), obits, real estate, clairvoyants, miracle cures, and palm readers... Gypsies, Tramps & Thieves
 
Lots of news about the Boer war, the picture (drawing) is “With Methuen, Storming A Kopie”.
A report on how the Boers were shocked by the British tactic of frontal charge with no regard for how many were killed because they had more. British losses were staggering but they won in the end.
 
6 Americans shot in Mexico.
3 Americans murdered and mutilated in the Philippines.
A Spaniard claims to have seen Major Rockefeller alive in the Philippines.
 
£10,000 in gold shipped in two boxes from London to the Bank of Peru arrived as lead pellets.
Soprano Marie Renard retires after 12 years of success to marry a prince.
The carpenters strike in Paris is over.
Five officers of Dutch mail steamer who went ashore on New Guinea were roasted and eaten.
 Maybe I could be a newspaper reader in a cigar factory.