What The Mail Brings.

N MY desk, there is a pile of circular letters, postal cards, circulars,

booklets of every degree

of pretension; blotters and almost every other conceivable thing used for advertising.

It

It all came about in this way. Several months ago, I had occasion to break into the advertising game. was a modest little attempt, hardly more than petty larceny, if even that. I made out a list of papers, or rather my friends in the advertising agency did for me, and we began. Replies? Of course I got them. But they were not all from prospective customers. They began coming almost immediately after the first advertisement had appeared, and they have kept coming continuously to this time. Each time there was a letter, saying that they had noticed my advertising, and then followed some very cogent reasons why I should put my advertising in that particular paper. I might have stopped all this by referring them to my agency except that my appropriation for the year was all placed, and I did not care to bother anybody with further letters about my account. So I just let them come. And it was an interesting family that soon gathered.

Once a week, regularly, I received a postal from a well known paper published in one of these western states. At first I paid but little attention to them until they came so regularly that, presently, I began to save them out of curiosity, and finally, I became impressed. They have quit coming now, and I suppose the publisher

and green inks being used. I wish the effect might be reproduced here in the original inks. On almost every page is a testimonial, and throughout the book they are so put in the reader can not help paying attention to them. If there is merit in testimonials, this little book certainly presents them in strong fashion. The matter of the book pertains entirely to calling attention to the excellent results obtained in the eleven states of the Mississippi Valley, advertising the Orange Judd Farmer. As I look at this

It is a noticeable fact that nearly all the booklets sent out by farm papers have a design on the front cover page. Editors of farm papers seem convinced beyond any possibility of change that some kind of design is needed to attract attention. Is it because they know that something of that sort is needed to impress their readers, and therefore, argue they, the same kind of bait will attract the advertiser? It may be. I don't pretend to know.

But once in a while, a book is sent out which has a conventional design ornainenting the title of the book it

self. Such a booklet is that sent out by the Fruit Grower, entitled "The Evolution of an Idea." Opening the book, one is greeted by the Fruit Grower's trade mark, the Brother Jonathan Apple with a happy smile. Nearly all readers of Agricultural Advertising are familiar with it but we are inclined to reproduce it just the same. On the other pages are half tone illustrations of Mr. James M. Irvine and his force of assistants. There is also an illustration of the Fruit Grower office building, and scenes about the office, giving one some idea of the completeness of this plant. One serious fault with the

book is that the reader is, at the start, referred to page nine, and then he looks in vain for the page folios. If he is very insistent in finding out what is on page 9, he has to begin at the front and count it out. Here he finds an interesting descriptive article written by Mr. Purd B. Wright, librarian of the St. Joseph Public Library.

One is inclined also to find fault with the way the half tones are printed. The cuts are all vignetted half tones, and the way the vignetting is done will not delight the eye of any one who is fond of good printing.

There are so few offices in which good half tone work can be obtained, that we marvel somewhat that the publishers of these books do not insist on

having square half tones. Almost any sort of a pressman can get good results from these, whereas it takes an artist to do anything with a vignetted half tone. A six dollar a week press boy cannot do it, and should not be expected to.

While no one has asked for our advice, we feel like giving it, nevertheless. It is, unless you have a first class pressman, one who understands his business, always use square half tones.

While on this subject of half tones, we might mention a little book just issued by the Citizens' Alliance, of Joliet, Ill. The art work is from the Art Department of the Long Critchfield Corporation. Many of the cuts are vignetted, and what can be accomplished in this line, is here shown to the best advantage. The press work is from the young and enter

prising firm of Sleepeck & Hellman, and it is sufficient to use the phrase of friend Miller of Freeport, "that they are the men who know."

Very often the mail brings to my desk some advertising matter from Collier's. Here is something that is worth every advertising man's study. The announcement for the Christmas number is a Maxfield Parrish drawing. No one would think of throwing that away. The reading matter is always of a high grade, and, once more, Collier's always brings us something unexpected. Their little book of the Gibson number, and now a mailing card with deckled edge, advise us the forms of Collier's are closed and issues oversold up to a certain date. Reading these we do not wonder that they make a success of this great magazine.

But all the advertising matter I have received did not come from papers or magazines. Some of these others, I will take up in another letter. This is enough for this time.