Leggett & Platt Spring Bed & Manufacturing

Collection Register, February 14, 1914—October 15, 1918

This partially used ledger book contains the collection records for wholesalers buying Leggett & Platt product during period above.

Information includes following columns in ledger: payee, where payable, date, time (not used), interest rate (not used), when due (not used), amount, interest, to whom sent [usually a bank], and remarks (generally not used).

Product purchased is not given. All entries appear to be furniture stores, hardware stores or mercantiles in the states of Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Colorado, Wyoming (very limited accounts) and Texas, the latter having the most entries of any other state. Most appear to be small or medium size towns and many are repeat buyers. A future volunteer project might consider the indexing of firm names by states especially if a special

Leggett & Platt history project was to come up. Indexing was not done as part of the MHRAB grant project as this ledger was found in collection storage separated from other Bank of Carthage items.

Western Historical Manuscript Collection in Rolla has other Leggett & Platt records in their collection available on microfilm as the originals were destroyed due to their poor condition. WHMC declined to microfilm this ledger when copying other items from the Bank of Carthage collection in 2000—02 before funding for microfilming was cut and project was severely downsized. Basic Leggett & Platt company information is found in the Powers Museum's Carthage Vertical File resources and the general county histories in the Reference Library.

A sample listing from the first entries are:
Smith Furniture Co; Helena, AR
John Schaeffer Furniture CO; Caldwell, KS
Berdon & Campbell Furniture CO; Lake Charles, LA
Boston Furniture CO, Kansas City; MO
Fugate-Frey Furniture CO; Raton, New Mexico
Ringstrud Mercantile; Elk Point, SD
Henslee Hardware; Celeste, TX

Subjects:
Leggett & Platt Manufacturing
Leggett & Platt Spring Bed & Manufacturing CO
Furniture Stores

Prior appointment necessary for use of all archival collections. This material is not available for walk-in, on-demand use. Consultation by phone or email prior to your visit, will result in a more successful research visit and allow museum staff to prepare materials and also a work space for your use on site.