RARE - 1880s Dayton Ohio Women Business Ephemera Archive Columbia Bridge Company For Sale

This museum-quality, fully intact historical archive dates from 1884 to 1887 and provides an extraordinary paper trail of Harriet Jane Skinner Morrison (Mrs. H.J. Morrison). As the widow of prominent Dayton civil engineer and Columbia Bridge Works founder David H. Morrison, Harriet did not step back from commerce after her husband\'s 1882 passing. Instead, this collection proves she took direct command of massive industrial capital, property portfolios, and household logistics in downtown Dayton, Ohio, utilizing accounts at the newly established City National Bank of Dayton.

This archive offers rare documentation of female financial empowerment during the Victorian era, showing how a Gilded Age matriarch actively managed both a heavy manufacturing enterprise and an upper-class household.

The Industrial and Corporate Ledger

The business portion of this archive highlights major financial transactions and land management required to keep an iron bridge foundry operating:

• City National Bank Checks: Multiple signed checks and receipts written for over $500 each (an immense sum at the time, equivalent to roughly $15,000+ today) demonstrating high-level capital control.

• Columbia Bridge Company: Direct receipts and payments tying Harriet to the heavy manufacturing firm responsible for building iron truss bridges across the Midwest.

• Key Business Associates: Multiple large $500 checks made out to J.B. Lehman for material management or foundry operations, large disbursements to Jasper (Grant, Gantt, or Ganster) for heavy hauling and field logistics, and a substantial $350 check to Samuel Button for site or hardware upkeep.

• City of Dayton Tax Receipts (1884-1886): Official municipal property tax records mapping out original city plat numbers (1657, 1670, 1689), South Warsaw Street side alleys, Southeast Conn Alley lots, and a valuable Miami and Erie Canal shipping wharf used to transport structural iron.

The High-Society Victorian Household

Alongside manufacturing ledgers, this archive preserves daily life, modern domestic infrastructure upgrades, and cultural spending in 1880s Dayton:

• Provisions and Catering: Receipts for daily essentials from the Family Grocery, North Corner Market, and Jefferson Street merchants, luxury deliveries of fresh Oysters and Fish, and an exquisite catering bill from F.J. Holden confectioner for French confections, fancy cakes, and ice cream.

• Home Utilities and Trades: Early infrastructure and maintenance records including bills from the Dayton Gas Light and Coke Company (documenting gas lighting or fuel upgrades), Dayton Waterworks, professional steam fitters, plumbers, and W.M. Hall locksmith and bell hanger.

• Fashion, Decor, and Services: Invoices from Elder, Hunter, and Johnston dry goods and notions, Van Ausdall and Garman house furnishing goods, A. Windler picture frame manufacturer on 5th Street, and an adjustment receipt from Eli Fassold for a Singer sewing machine.

• Insurance and Legacy: Policy receipts from the Teutonia Fire Insurance Company and a touching maintenance receipt from the Woodland Cemetery Association for keeping up the family burial lot at Dayton\'s historic Woodland Cemetery and Arboretum.

Condition and Preservation

The paper items exhibit natural aging, light toning, and minor creases appropriate for documents that are approximately 140 years old. The ink signatures, corporate engravings, and handwritten merchant ledgers remain remarkably sharp and clear. This grouping represents an irreplaceable primary source archive for historians studying Gilded Age business, Miami and Erie Canal infrastructure, local Dayton genealogy, and the underestimated financial authority of 19th-century women.

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