"EBay may be a great resource for avid collectors, but it has also opened up a world of antiquarian goods that may have never found their way into an archive or museum before now."

Consuming History?
Molly McCarthy

Part I | II | III

Does this mean early Americanists should not even bother with eBay? Hardly. It may be harder for us to find the treasures that curators after more modern wares can load up on without much effort, but they are there. I conducted a small, and embarrassingly unscientific, experiment. I gave myself only 15 minutes to cruise eBay's "Antiques & Art" and "Collectibles" categories in search of pre-1850 matter. In less than 10, I produced a handful of "hits" in various price ranges, finds that would surely make some in the fields of early American history salivate. The short list ranged from a mid-eighteenth-century sampler from Pennsylvania ($1,375) to an 1830 farmer's account book from Massachusetts ($22). With only a few days left before the end of these auctions, neither of the items had elicited a bid. Now the sampler may be a bit pricey for some historians. It's definitely not in my budget. But others seemed well within reach.

The fact is historians after modern material may have had more success on eBay because they have nowhere else to go. Let's face it. Early Americanists, especially those relying on more traditional sources, have plenty of places to turn to find what they need. Libraries have been collecting this material for years. And microform collections bring a lot of the most heavily used items to those working in smaller or more remote libraries. So early Americanists may believe that they don't need to plumb eBay to round out their bibliographies. Those scholars doing material culture and modern American studies are more likely to invest the time and money required on eBay because there are fewer research avenues open to them. Yet, some early Americanists realize the dangers of that assumption, as one curator commented. "I am concerned that we might be missing out on some worthwhile manuscripts," he said.

Despite such concerns expressed by some history pros, others stubbornly cling to more traditional methods of acquiring the past. Besides not wanting to their waste their time and money, some scholars claim that the online auction site is peddling the same merchandise you'd see in dealers' catalogues. The dealers have just moved their markets online, right? Well, not exactly. EBay may be a great resource for avid collectors, but it has also opened up a world of antiquarian goods that may have never found their way into an archive or museum before now. Traditionally, archival or special collections librarians rely on dealers' catalogues to pinpoint material for acquisition. Oftentimes, a library will develop a close relationship with a dealer who will keep them apprized of items of particular interest. While eBay has not eliminated these modes of acquisition, it has enabled curators to explore other purchasing avenues never before open to them.

For the first time, curators such as Russell L. Martin III of the American Antiquarian Society are able to purchase items from individuals who are not professional dealers. Martin has acquired over 30 items on eBay for AAS, admittedly a fraction of the "hundreds of titles" the library acquires every year through more conventional means. Still, Martin relishes the opportunity to locate small treasures online. He recently won a run of a German-language periodical called Americanische Schul-Zeitung published in Louisville, Ky., in the 1870s. Another of Martin's most cherished eBay finds is an 1877 pamphlet entitled "Meal Feeding and Animal Digestion: Addresses Delivered Before the Annual Meeting of the Pennsylvania State Dairyman's Association at Meadsville, Pa., 1875." "More than likely, this pamphlet would never have graced a book-dealer's catalogue, but it is a previously unrecorded edition …. Who should care? AAS, of course," said Martin, curator of newspapers and periodicals.

"EBay, at present at least, strikes me as a venue for the 'little guy'," Martin notes. "The great majority of my eBay transactions have been with individuals, not dealers." Thus the former owner of the AAS's Americanische Schul-Zeitung was not a professional antiquarian bookseller, but a man from Indiana who was also selling a "Cat Tail Cookie Jar," some "Cobalt Blue Swirl Salad Plates, and a "Dove on a Nest Milk Glass." As Martin summed up, "EBay is a national garage sale." As such, Martin admits, eBay will never replace the AAS's reliance on booksellers' catalogues, quotes, and expertise. But eBay does provide an additional and valuable tool.

A lifelong stamp collector as well as a professional historian, Dane Claussen hopes the embrace of eBay among many scholars may encourage historians to seek out private collectors for research assistance. Claussen thinks academics tend to be too arrogant or reticent when it comes to seeking out the assistance of layfolk. "I wonder if some scholars ... either a) doubt that nonscholars are/can be experts on subjects of interest to scholars and/or b) are threatened by the fact that some nonscholars really do know more about certain subjects than scholars do," said Claussen, an assistant professor of communications and mass media at Southwest Missouri State University. "Scholars need to start doing their own detective work and seek out collectors and ask to see their collections."

Because eBay provides e-mail addresses for all its sellers and bidders, it has never been easier to reach out to collectors who may share a historical interest. While some historians complain that they cannot compete with collectors' passions and deep pockets, others realize that they don't necessarily need to own an item to use it for their research. E-mail the winning bidder. She might invite you to view her collection or perhaps even borrow an item or two. You might find someone like Frank Scaglione, who retired early from AT&T Bell Labs to take up his hobby full time. He's a collector-turned-dealer on eBay and trades in everything from Revolutionary War documents to dinosaur eggs. Or Tim Franklin, who quit a 9-to-5 job to sell on eBay. "The neat thing about [eBay] is that I have the entire world looking in my little window to see what I have for sale, whereas if I had a shop here in Bloomsburg, PA, I'd be starving," Franklin said. Instead, Franklin now counts on the business of a nation full of addicts . . . like me.

I was introduced to eBay in the summer of 1999 by a retired manuscripts curator who heard me deliver a paper at the Berkshire Women's History Conference. The paper was on nineteenth-century commercial pocket diaries, a chunk of my dissertation on the evolution of the daily diary in America. Before my talk, I apologized to the small crowd because I didn't have a pocket diary to pass around the audience. They would have to content themselves with dimly-lit slides. The curator, already an eBay convert, suggested later by e-mail that I might find a few diaries on eBay.

Well, he was right. EBay opened up a world of diaries I never knew existed. Like more traditional archives, eBay had its share of Civil War diaries, travel journals, and farmers' almanacs. But with a quick click of the mouse I uncovered diary formats it would have taken me years to assemble from more conventional collections. Dozens of Boy Scout diaries. A host of diaries published by the Wanamaker Department Store. Diary almanacs hawking everything from liver pills to horse feed. Even the Spice Girls had their own diary, published annually and geared--I can only imagine--toward teenage girls. I certainly wasn't going to turn up that gem at the local historical society. More than two dozen diaries later, the only thing I probably need now is a good 12-step program. And the "A-ha" moments continue even though I've been browsing eBay regularly for more than a year. I continually find new diaries or diary-related innovations that reinvigorate my undertaking and will push me forward to, hopefully, a rousing finish.

All this said, my enthusiasm for the dot.com auction medium has not erased my doubts about its acceptance in the academy as a venerable research tool, nor eliminated some of the more disturbing trends cited above. But it is a good feeling to know I am not alone. EBay appears to hold great promise for me and many others in the business of doing history, and I'd say more about it if I had time. Got an auction ending in 5 minutes. EBay is calling.

Further Reading:

Baker, Nicholson. "Deadline." The New Yorker 24 July 2000: 42-56.

Bombardieri, Marcella and John Ellement. "Stolen Goods Making Way to Internet, Fencing Schemes Use Online Auction Sites." Boston Globe 1 June 2000: A1.

Dobrzynski, Judith H. "F.B.I. Opens Investigation of eBay Bids." New York Times 7 June 2000: C1.

Hansell, Saul and Judith H. Dobrzynski. "EBay Cancels Art Sale and Suspends Seller." New York Times 11 May 2000: A1.

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