Frankie Raymond, from the Actresses series (N245) issued by Kinney Brothers to promote Sweet Caporal Cigarettes
Medium
Albumen photograph
Dimensions
Sheet: 2 1/2 × 1 7/16 in. (6.4 × 3.7 cm)
Classification
Photographs|Ephemera
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
The Jefferson R. Burdick Collection, Gift of Jefferson R. Burdick
Accession Number
63.350.220.245.1492
Tags
Art Historical Context
This petite albumen photograph, titled *Frankie Raymond, from Actresses series (N245)*, captures the allure of late 19th-century theater stardom. Issued in 1890 by the Kinney Brothers Tobacco Company to their Sweet Caporal Cigarettes, is one of many trading cards tucked into cigarette packs to entice collectors and boost sales. Measuring just 2½ × 1⅜ inches, this ephemera exemplifies the era's marketing ingenuity, transforming everyday tobacco products into gateways for popular culture fandom. The albumen process, a hallmark of 19th-century photography, involved coating paper with egg whites ...
About the Artist
Kinney Brothers Tobacco Company · 1869–2011
**Kinney Brothers Tobacco Company (1869–2011)** Founded around 1869 by Francis Sherwood Kinney in New York City, the Kinney Brothers Tobacco Company quickly rose to prominence in the burgeoning American cigarette industry. Francis, a pioneering tobacco manufacturer, experimented with hand-rolled cigarettes using blends of Turkish and Virginia tobacco, scaling to mass production by employing Europ...