This is a late nineteenth-century business card for George H. Gage (1848–1931), who lived in West Boylston, Massachusetts, and was a sales agent for “the Patent Rug Machine.”

Perhaps “The Griffin” – an early punch needle – was the “Patent Rug Machine” that Gage represented as an agent. The text on the cover of a leaflet about The Griffin (see the History of Punch Needle on the Oxford Company’s site) provides the following details about the machine and its patents: “The Improved Griffin Rug Machine. Manufactured by G. W. Griffin & Co., Franklin Falls, New Hampshire. Patented Aug. 23, 1881, and April 13, 1886.”

Geo. H. Gage
Agent for the Patent Rug Machine
West Boylston, Mass.

The typography features two typefaces that have similar names and were both designed by Charles E. Heyer: the shaded caps used for the name are from Steelplate, patented Aug. 30, 1881, for Barnhart Brothers & Spindler. The job description is set in Copperplate Italic, cut by Heyer a decade earlier for the Boston Type Foundry. The caps for the location are from an unidentified Gothic.