Although, as the company name states, heaters were Ashman’s primary product, they produced this scale for postal customers’ use. In the years before parcel post and “collect-on-delivery” or COD services, the company offered to mail the scale to customers and receive the $1.00 price after sending the product.
Sturgis Manufacturing Company was a small company that operated in Baltimore, Maryland in the early 20th century. The company produced “the Dixie,” a postal scale that one advertisement called “one of the simplest, cheapest and most convenient devices ever invented for weighing mail matter.” The scale sold for 25-cents and was made in satin finish aluminum.
