Elliott Service Company Posters???
 

I recently picked up some sports posters from the 1950s by the Elliott Service Co. Anyone know what this company was? And how they distributed their posters? They came mailed in a tube...this one was dated 1953 on the postal stamp.

The poster came in two parts...the photo portion and then a caption...poster measures 17" x 14".

Dan

I have some from 1920-21. They are real photographs and from my understanding they were point of sale advertisements for sports pages and newspapers. There are non-sports as well for various topics throughout the 1920's-1940's.

Rhys

Thanks Rhys, the posters are printed on thick photo like paper...with the caption being on thin paper.

Dan, cool pieces. I haven't checked mine out but I think this is one of those too.

Very cool Clint....doesn't seem to be anything out there on the internet about these and I couldn't find any past discussion in the search.

Subscription News Service Posters
 

I've always liked these old news-service posters (issuers called them "broadsides") as display items, and they're very affordable. I've had literally thousands of them over the years; the vast majority deal with subjects other than sports. This seems like a good place to share some information and I hope others can add to it.

For a fee, subscribers (usually libraries and schools) would receive the posters by mail several times a week - often several at a time. Special display cases were available for use in public places. Over the years, I've seen photos showing them displayed at newsstands, dining counters, banks, tobacco shops and other places. The idea, of course, was to spark conversation and attract attention. The trick was to place advertising in the vicinity to cash in on that attention.

The best known issuer was ILLUSTRATED CURRENT NEWS, based in New Haven Connecticut. They were issued three times a week starting in 1913. They were mailed flat in a consistent 12 1/2" x 19" horizontal format until the 1950s. At that point, they were enlarged to a 16" x 19" size with an area across the bottom for generic advertising messages. These larger posters were shipped rolled in tubes. A 1959 circulation statement cited 5,318 paid subscriptions. ICNs were still being issued well into the 1970s. The non-sports posters are a great record of events, scientific advances, fashion trends, celebrities, space exploration, wars, politics, etc. Please note that there was a reprinting of about 25 of the high-appeal sports posters back in the 1980s...the 1939 HOF induction, etc...so tread carefully.

ELLIOTT NEWS SERVICE was issuing posters as far back as 1922. I sold one in the mailing tube at a 1990s National showing the dedication of the Ohio Stadium. If memory serves, that was about 14" x 18".

INTERNATIONAL EVENTS (THE WORLDS' NEWS IN PICTURES) was published daily from 1938 to at least 1940 by International Events, Inc. of Chicago. They are 11" wide and 17" tall and were shipped rolled in tubes.

DISPATCH PHOTO NEWS SERVICE was issuing similar posters during World War II, and I've seen similar posters from World War I. I believe these were 14" wide and 18" tall and were shipped rolled in tubes.

The same idea was executed for point-of-sale display in a 1930s series called "LAST MINUTE PHOTO" promoting "New York's Picture Newspaper - The News) comes to mind. As far as I know, it wasn't sold to third parties.

There were also posters featuring a "Believe It Or Not" panel cartoon knock-off called "DIDJA' KNOW?" issued by The Bertlee System of Chicago in the 1930s. They were based in the Hearst Building. I'm sure there were others.

Please add any corrections or additional information!

Thank you Rick! I'm not sure how these have escaped my attention all these years.

Nice post on news service photos. Just FYI, I have several 1921 Elliott News Service photos so they were around at least in '21 and I think a few years earlier. Thanks for the great additional info!

RE: Info. on Elliott News Service Photo Posters
 

Hello all. I came across this old forum thread while googling some pictorial news posters from the Elliott News Co. I discovered white previewing a rural auction this week.

The ones I've found are 1920's. There are approximately 100 of them, very good condition, generally, most with original caption sheets intact. They are large format. I didn't measure, but I'd guess approx. 14 x 20. Subjects are some military and aviation but mainly general news of the day.

If a stranger to your forums could beg some advice, what would be a reasonable amount to pay for approximately 100 of these at auction (I'm thinking no more than a low wholesale price), let's assume common / general subject matter with maybe a few standouts of special interest?

I collect odd photography formats and ideally I'd like to ebay a few to offset purchase price and keep the others.

Thanks y'all, you've already provided a great source of info. on these apparently little-known relics of news photography.

I've always thought these were the biggest bargains in the hobby, great display pieces with fabulous images. I have a bunch of "Associated News Service" posters, published by Elliot News Service, with two holes in the top to fit some kind of display device, probably at news stands. I also have Elliot News Service poster of the 1924 and 1925 Washington pennant winners with ads for Mazda auto lamps. Over the years, I've seen numerous other brands with different format news posters, including a panorama-style poster for the 1924 World Series by "Fotoform News." I'd love to include the pictures I've taken of these, but the Net54 attachment program will never allow those taken by my camera to upload. They are JPGs of 3.65 MB, too big, perhaps? Copy and paste doesn't work, either.

Hank, there are numerous online image resizers. Easy to google them. What I do though if I have a pic that is too big I just load it up on my facebook page and then save the image to my computer. Facebook I've found automatically reduces the file size of photos.

Hank, I'm pretty sure Net54 does the resizing. I post multiple MB pictures on here all the time.

Thanks, guys. Dan, do you know offhand if you can post photos on FB without them appearing on your timeline or news feed? And Rob, I just get an "upload failed" message from Net54 when I browse my pictures file and click on one I want to attach to my post. I will get on the Google machine and see about resizing the photos, I guess the idea is to make them smaller than the Net54 maximum size before I try to post them?

Hank, it will show on your timeline, but I usually just post them, then save them to my computer, then delete them off of facebook. Takes less than a minute.

But that way wouldn't my FB friends see these on the news feed, which I wouldn't want? I'll try to figure out how to resize them myself.

Hi-
I resize my photos and scans right on my computer. I right click on the image and choose edit. In the photo editor that pops up, I click on resize and I resize by percentage. Depending on how big the image is I typically resize at least 50% and sometimes down to 20% to ensure it fits into Net54.

On another note, I love these display photos and (shameless plug alert) LOTG has a bunch of mine that should make their way into auctions over the next year or so. All of the ones I consigned were sports related, and include some really cool images of HOFers and in action sports (baseball and football primarily) from the early 1940s (all with paper war bond labels).

Alan

Couldn't get it to work. I tried resizing to 20%, the upload still failed, and when I tried by pixels, the picture fuzzed up. Got to tell you this stuff really drives me crazy. Samsung camera, Compaq computer, not like I'm trying to do anything complicated. Downloading photos to my computer's a piece of cake, why isn't uploading to Net54 the same?

They might see it for a minute or so before you delete it. Sometimes I just leave the pics up on facebook and it starts a good conversation there too.

Hank sent me images of his news service photos. They are below. I really like the images on these. The panorama one is incredible!

Alan

Wow Hank, those look great! Alan thanks for providing the assist.

Thanks, Scott, and yes, thanks to Alan for helping out the tech challenged of the world. I've always loved the news posters, they are the very definition of ephemera. Including a couple others of Walter I have yet to frame and get up on the wall, the one with the Babe and Doug Fairbanks is the only one I've seen a duplicate of. Illustrated Current News seems to be the most common, perhaps because of the repros, but even they have dried up lately. As a category, they are truly undervalued in the hobby, IMO.