Billhead receipts are
receipt
A receipt (also known as a packing list, packing slip, packaging slip, (delivery) docket, shipping list, delivery list, bill of the parcel, manifest, or customer receipt) is a document acknowledging that a person has received money or propert ...
s that were commonly used in
business transactions from the late 1860s through the early 1940s. They can be found in present-day transactions, although they are less common today.
Many billhead receipts were illustrated and decorated with fancy
steel engraving
Steel engraving is a technique for printing illustrations based on steel instead of copper. It has been rarely used in artistic printmaking, although it was much used for reproductions in the 19th century. Steel engraving was introduced in 1792 by ...
s, while others carried no illustrations. In either case, the receipt was important, as it stood as your
proof of delivery. Most billheads would bear the company's name and address, a unique
invoice
An invoice, bill or tab is a commerce, commercial document issued by a sales, seller to a buyer relating to a sale transaction and indicating the product (business), products, quantities, and agreed-upon prices for products or Service (economic ...
number, the payment terms, line items for products or services, a total, and (optionally) handwritten notes.
Vintage Ephemera
Billheads are considered to be vintage
ephemera
Ephemera are transitory creations which are not meant to be retained or preserved. Its etymological origins extends to Ancient Greece, with the common definition of the word being: "the minor transient documents of everyday life". Ambiguous in ...
. Some collect billheads from a certain state, region, or town; others base their collections on types of
illustration
An illustration is a decoration, interpretation or visual explanation of a text, concept or process, designed for integration in print and digital published media, such as posters, flyers, magazines, books, teaching materials, animations, vid ...
s. In some cases, a relative or ancestor may have owned the business or even have
signed the document.
References
* {{citation , year=2000 , title = The encyclopedia of ephemera: a guide to the fragmentary documents of everyday life for the collector, curator, and historian , author1=Maurice Rickards , author2=Michael Twyman , editor1=Michael Twyman , edition=illustrated, reprint , publisher=Routledge , isbn=978-0-415-92648-5 , pages=49–52 , url=https://books.google.com/books?id=T4O3vIHhjoUC&pg=PA50&dq=billhead&ved=0CDYQ6AEwAw
Ephemera