Mason, Ehrman & Co. product labels

Collection

Identifier: Coll 1086

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

The collection consists of more than 120 labels for food products sold by the wholesale grocery firm Mason, Ehrman & Co., based in Portland, Oregon, under the firm's Royal Club brand. Most of the labels are for canned fruit and vegetables, featuring color photographs of the products, as well as information about the can size, weight, number of servings, and number of cups. Other food products represented in the collection include pumpkin pie filling, marshmallow fluff, ketchup (written as "tomato catsup"), cranberry sauce, sauerkraut, mincemeat, tomato juice, and fruit juice. Most labels also identify the location of Mason, Ehman & Co.'s main office in Portland and the locations of the firm's wholesale houses in Oregon and Idaho.

Dates

Creation: circa 1935-1955

Creator

Mason, Ehrman & Co. (Organization)

Conditions Governing Access

Collection is open for research.

Conditions Governing Use

The Oregon Historical Society owns the materials in the Research Library and makes available reproductions for research, publication, and other uses. The Society does not necessarily hold copyright to all materials in the collections. In some cases, permission for use may require seeking additional authorization from copyright owners.

Administrative history

Mason, Ehrman & Co. (sometimes written as Mason-Ehrman and Company or Mason-Ehrman Co.) was a wholesale grocery firm based in Portland, Oregon. It was founded in 1885 by future Portland mayor William S. Mason (1832-1899) and his business partner, Edward Ehrman (1854-1933). By 1934, the firm had wholesale houses in Astoria, Klamath Falls, and Medford, Oregon; and in Lewiston and Moscow, Idaho. After the sale of the houses in Klamath Falls and Medford in 1958, only the Idaho houses were still operational. The firm was defunct by 1970.

Sources: Obituary for William S. Mason in the Oregonian, March 21, 1899, page 1; obituary for Edward Ehrman in the Oregonian, August 2, 1933, page 1; "Grocery Upturn Seen," Oregonian, September 9, 1934, Section 7, page 1; "Grocery Firm Selling Out," Herald and News (Klamath Falls, Oregon), September 18, 1958, page 4A; "Check to Pay '48 Bill Found Delayed in Mail," Idaho Statesman, March 14, 1969, page 34; Portland city directories, 1969-1971.

Extent

0.1 Cubic Feet (1 folder in shared box)

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

Abstract

Product labels for Mason, Ehrman & Co.'s Royal Club brand products. Most labels are for canned fruit or vegetables, but also include other foodstuffs, such as ketchup, pumpkin pie mix, and fruit juices. Mason, Ehrman & Company was a wholesale grocery business based in Portland, Oregon. It was founded in 1885 by William S. Mason (1832-1899) and Edward Ehrman (1854-1933). In the early and mid-20th century, the firm operated wholesale houses in Astoria, Oregon; Klamath Falls, Oregon; Medford, Oregon; Lewiston, Idaho; and Moscow, Idaho.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Gift of Spencer M. Ehrman, Sr., September 1994 (Lib. Acc. 21941).

Separated Materials

A ledger that was donated to the Oregon Historical Society Research Library with these labels was cataloged separately as Coll 1087, Wholesale grocery ledger kept by Spencer M. Ehrman, Sr.

Processing Information

At the time the collection was donated to the Oregon Historical Society Research Library, the labels were glued to pages housed in a binder. These pages were removed from the binder before the collection was processed, most likely around the time of donation. During processing of the collection by Jeffrey A. Hayes in 2025, most labels no longer adhered to the pages. For preservation purposes, plastic page coverings were removed, and in cases where the labels no longer adhered to the pages, the labels were rehoused and the empty pages were discarded.