Did Gordon ever release the Project: 101 Years Of Mailorder?

Ah yes. The last I worked with it, it was going to be used as a Bonus for the Green Tree Press "Swipe File" that I worked on in the summer of 09.

The owner of GTP decided upon a different direction for his company, so my work (along with Dien's really good book) was shelved.

The 101 years project started when the Summit County Library in Akron, OH was being renovated a few years back and they temporarily moved into an old grocery store building for a couple of years.

During this time, their basement archives (which normally required a special library card) were open and available and their magazine/newspaper/newsletter section went back to before the American Civil War.

I daily researched and made copies of ads that were run in every publication they had. It took me the whole summer at about 2 hours a day to compile this 101 years of advertising.

Remarkably, some of the ads, for example Surplus Binoculars, have run almost continuously in the original form for all these decades.

There was a boom in Direct Response Ads after every conflict, with the heyday coming in the 50's and 60s after WWII and the baby boomers were being made.

These copies are in storage in Ohio, I haven't looked at them for over 2 years and really have very little interest in anything related to mail order, direct marketing or copywriting at this point. That being said, I'd be glad to offer some suggestions to you if you will email me at [email protected]

Thanks for taking the time to read our archives.

Gordon Jay Alexander



I found some old threads on here about gordon putting together a giant swipe file of classified ads that have been running for years. He called it "101 Years Of Mailorder" I think.

I'm currently testing thrifty nickels and need all the help I can get and when I found about him putting together this classified ads swipe I knew I had to find it.

Any help is greatly appreciated thank you.