Garrat Noel
Garrat Noel | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1706 Cádiz, Spain |
| Died | 1776 Elizabethtown, New Jersey |
| Occupation(s) | Educator, bookseller |
| Years active | 1750–1776 |
| Known for | Bookselling and circulating library in New York City |
Garrat Noel (1706–1776) was a prominent 18th-century educator and bookseller based in New York City.[1] Originally from Cádiz, he relocated to New York in 1750.[2] By the following year, 1751, he was instructing students in Spanish, literacy, arithmetic, and bookkeeping for merchants.[3] By 1752, he had established a retail outlet on Broad Street,[4] and by 1753 he moved his shop to Dock Street.[5] His establishment featured a circulating library boasting several thousand volumes encompassing history, theology, travel narratives, voyages, and fiction.[6][7][8]
Noel’s merchandise extended well beyond literature to include stationery and various miscellaneous items: playing cards, powdered ink, paper sold by the ream or quire, penknives, pencils, quills and pens, wax seals, inkpots with pewter stands and containers, pasteboard files with laces, brass-wire files, assorted blanks, scales and dividers, pocket compasses, pounce with pounce-boxes, memorandum books, fountain pens, ivory folders, leather cases for paper storage, blank account ledgers, alphabets and copybooks for writing practice as well as receipt books; additionally he stocked imported products such as tooth powder (Stoughton's Bitters), lotion water, smelling bottles,[9] viper drops, Turlington’s and West’s pectoral elixirs, lavender drops and scented water.[10][11][12][13][14]
In 1753 his store featured "curious bustos" crafted from plaster of paris—finished with gold polish and burnish—mounted on black pedestals depicting figures such as Shakespeare, Milton, Homer, Virgil, Horace, Cicero, Plato, Caesar and Seneca; alongside contemporary style paintings.[15]
Among the notable works available in 1755 were:[16]
- Aphra Behn's dramatic works
- Bowen's New Atlas
- Bysshe's treatise on poetry
- Francis Coventry's The History of a Lap Dog
- Laurence Echard's Gazetteer
- Henry Fielding's Voyage to Lisbon
- The Gardner's Dictionary
- Harrison's House-keepers Pocket Companion
- David Hartley's Observations on Man
- Edward Hatton's Mathematical Manual
- Eliza Haywood's Female Spectator
- Peter Heylyn's Help to English History
- James Arbuckle's Letters
- The Hive: a Collection of Choice New Songs
- Griffith Hughes' Natural History of Barbados
- Hutcheson's edition of Xenophon
- Independent Whig
- Alain-René Lesage's The Batchelor of Salamanca
- Noël-Antoine Pluche's History of the Heavens
- John Potter's Antiquities of Greece
- The Tatler
- Wishart's Commentaries on the late War in Italy
- The World in Miniature
- The Young Lady Conducted
Anecdotal accounts mention a customer journeying from "some distance up Hudson River" to acquire "Spanish bulls" advertised by Noel; however this individual mistakenly believed them to be livestock.[17]
Garrat Noel passed away in 1776 at Elizabethtown, New Jersey.[18]
See also
Further reading
- Joseph Sabin, Bibliotheca Americana, New York, 1881, volume 13, section on Noel
- David Kaser, A Book for a Sixpence: the Circulating Library in America, Beta Phi Mu, Pittsburgh, 1980, section covering Garrat Noel
References
- ↑ WorldCat. Garrat Noel
- ↑ "Garrett Noel, the first New York bookseller." Magazine of American history v.16, no.1, July 1886
- ↑ New York Gazette Revived in the Weekly Post-Boy, June 10, 1751
- ↑ New York Mercury, Nov. 13, 1752
- ↑ New York Mercury, Dec. 31, 1753
- ↑ "To those who delight in reading ..." New York Gazette, Aug. 29, 1763
- ↑ "Conditions for subscribing to Noel's Circulating Library ..." cf. New York Gazette, Sept. 12, 1763
- ↑ "To promote useful knowledge ... a circulating library ... by Garrat Noel;" cf. New York Gazette and Weekly Mercury, Sept. 5, 1768
- ↑ Smelling-bottle: "phial or small bottle for containing smelling-salts or perfume ready for use;" cf. Oxford English Dictionary
- ↑ A Catalogue of Books ... to be Sold by Garrat Noel ... 1755
- ↑ Advertisement: "The only true preservative for the teeth and gums ... sold by Garrat Noel;" cf. New York Gazette
- ↑ "To be sold by Garret Noel ... Eau de Luce;" cf. New York Mercury
- ↑ "Best Durham Flour of Mustard and fine snuff;" cf. New York Gazette
- ↑ Noel sold wallpaper: "handsome patterns of flowered paper for hangings" cf. Advertisement in New York Gazette
- ↑ New York Mercury
- ↑ Catalogue. 1755
- ↑ Pennsylvania Packet
- ↑ New York Gazette and Weekly Mercury