Finding Aids

The Collection of Philadelphia merchants records comprises the papers of major and minor merchant houses in Philadelphia throughout the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and primarily documents trade with major port cities in Western Europe and the West Indies. Included are the papers of merchants Andrew Clow & Co., Dutilh & Wachsmuth, Manuel Eyre, and George Louis de Stockar, along with records of other miscellaneous merchants from the Philadelphia area. The records include correspondence, accounts, bills, orders, invoices and other material that give insight into the rise of capitalism in the Early Republic.

Lanman & Kemp was a multi-generational family firm of wholesale druggists in New York City. Their records document the operations of the wholesale drug business in the years before the development of modern pharmaceuticals. They also show the importance of New York City as a center for the import, export and re-export business and of London bankers in financing international trade and extending credit.