Sackett & Wilhelms Corporation, Framed 1916 Third Liberty Loan Poster. Depicts a young soldier shaking his father's hand farewell, with the slogan above: "Good Bye, Dad, I'm Off To Fight For Old Glory, You Buy U.S. GOV'T BONDS." Signed lower left by Lawrence S. Harris (c. 1873-1951). Framed.

Condition: Minor spotting and tears. 

Overall SIze: 30 1/4 x 20 3/8 in. 

Sight Size: 28 1/2 x 19 3/4 in. 

#5 #3573 . 

Charles Wilhelms (1849-1906) emigrated to America from Germany when he was a child and later worked in New York City as a lithographer for Seibert & Brother and at Snyder & Black before founding his own company. Wilhelms Lithographics specialized in trade cards, book illustrations, advertising lithography, and sheet music covers. By the late 1870s, Wilhelms entered into business with Charles and Frederick Schmolze, under the name Schmolze Brothers & Wilhelms prior to partnering with Robert Sackett and Edward Betzig in 1882. In 1889 Wilhelms’s company’s name changed to Sackett & Wilhelms Corporation after Betzig left the firm over disagreements about printing books as well as lithographs, and the company remained under that name until it closed in 1950. Ironically their biggest contribution to world history is not their many thousands of posters and lithographs, particularly propaganda posters for both World Wars, but the solution they sought to a heatwave in 1902 that nearly shut down their printing press in the famous Judge Building in the Flatiron District of Manhattan. They reached out to the engineer Willis Haviland Carrier of Buffalo to help find a way to decrease the humidity in their space, as it was causing the paper they used to warp and shrink, as well as rusting the mechanical pieces of the press. Carrier designed the first modern air conditioning system for them, and from the experience established the four functions that all air conditioning must serve: control temperature, control humidity, control air circulation and ventilation, and cleanse the air. Their gratitude at his work resulted in them creating every illustration for all editions of Carrier’s “The Engineer’s Hand-book,” the definitive text on the subject, up until their closure.

Minor spotting and tears.