Varia

1924 · 001684 — Chicago Ill: Montgomery Ward & Co. 1924. Softcover. First edition; 13 ¼ x 9; pp. 724; illustrated wraps; chips with some loss of paper to edges; fore-edge of pages a bit brittle; darkening and staining to upper corner; illustrated in b & w and color; good to very good condition. A massive catalog known as the “Wish Book†of the self-proclaimed “most progressive and oldest†mail order house it was published in the last year of its dry-goods mail-order-only business model before the first retail outlet store was opened in Plymouth Indiana in 1926. Founded in 1872 by Aaron Ward the business was demolished before and reestablished after the Great Chicago Fire became known for the then revolutionary “satisfaction guaranteed or your money back†policy and was nominated by the Grolier Club as one of the 100 books to influence the life and culture of US Americans. Known for their reasonable prices and enormous lavishly-illustrated catalogs the company would also be remembered for creating the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer character as part of a promotional Christmas campaign in 1939. Chicago, Ill: Montgomery Ward & Co. paperback books