R. C. Maxwell Company Collection

The R. C. Maxwell Company was incorporated in 1894. Until its sale in 2000, it was the oldest surviving outdoor company in the U.S. The company retained thousands of 8" x 10" professional photographs of its billboards and other advertising. Dating from 1917, the earliest images are on glass negatives. Most of the scenes show places in New Jersey, with smaller numbers from Pennsylvania and other localities. Because the excellent photos show outdoor advertising in its urban or rural setting--with cars and people, movie theaters and shops, boardwalks and beaches--they record valuable vignettes of American culture in the early part of the 20th century.

David C. Maxwell, son of founder R. C. Maxwell, donated the company's extensive photograph collection, along with early financial records, house advertisements, and several hundred documents, to Duke University beginning in 1996. The Maxwell Collection presents a uniquely comprehensive record of regional outdoor advertising over a period of nearly 80 years. Duke is extremely grateful to Mr. Maxwell for this gift and also for some financial support of this fine collection.

The Maxwell photographs are arranged chronologically by a numerical system devised by the company. Preservation and indexing work is underway as part of a National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grant generously awarded to the Hartman Center in 2000 for the arranging and describing of eleven Outdoor Advertising collections. Over 500 pre-1929 R. C. Maxwell Company images can be viewed on the Emergence of Advertising in America web site. Hundreds of image descriptions (no images) of R. C. Maxwell photographs dating between the 1910s and 1952 are available on-line through the ROAD (Resource of Outdoor Advertising Descriptions) database.

We provide here a capsule history of the R.C. Maxwell Company, drawn from its centennial literature, and several examples of photographs from the collection. For additional information about the outdoor advertising collections at Duke, contact the Hartman Center.

A Capsule History of the Company

The R. C. Maxwell Company was founded by Robert Chester Maxwell in 1894. In the late nineteenth century, railroads were the primary means of travel and commerce, so Mr. Maxwell built "bill-boards," structures of wooden boards on which printed advertising bills were posted, to be seen by those riding the steel rails.

With the advent of the automobile, those rail travelers started driving along the growing network of roads and highways, and the R. C. Maxwell Company began building the now familiar roadside billboards to reach them.

For over a century, billboards have been informing and entertaining motorists, becoming a unique part of of American culture. With the development of incandescent lights, electric display signs were added to the company's repertoire. Mr. Maxwell, seeing great possibilities in these "spectaculars," established the Electric Sign Manufacturing Plant in Atlantic City. In the 1920s he erected such landmarks as the giant fifty foot Colgate thermometer (the world's largest) and a unique all-neon display on the roof of the Atlantic City Million Dollar Pier which featured four horses racing around a track with a random winner every three minutes.

As media have evolved and changed in the course of the 20th century, the R. C. Maxwell Company headquartered in Trenton, New Jersey, continues to serve the advertising industry in new ways.

Samples of the R. C. Maxwell Company's Photograph Collection...

Billed as "The worlds largest and most beautiful spectacular electric display" when it was built in 1926, this sign, designed and constructed by the R. C. Maxwell Company, was the height of high-tech in its day. It was located on the Steeplechase Pier at Pennsylvania Avenue and Boardwalk in Atlantic City. In a 75 Second cycle, the 13,000 bulbs intertwined in 27 colored steps, finishing in a burst of gold and white before fading out to begin again.

The Miss America Pageant has been a unique tradition in Atlantic City since 1932. The contestants would parade along the boardwalk during the pageant week, often in floats constructed by the R. C. Maxwell Company.

Wall signs like these were common on city streets early in this century. Today, only faded ghosts remain.

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