Samuel Shacklett Store Daybooks, 1845-1866

Repository:

Special Collections, Carrier Library, James Madison University

Creator:

Shacklett, Samuel, 1804-1886

Title:

Samuel Shacklett Store Daybooks

Collection No.:

SC 0168

Date:

1845-1866

Extent:

2 boxes, 1.36 Cubic Feet

Language of the Material:

English

Abstract:

Four daybooks, which cover 1845, September 1851-August 1852, January 1856-March 1858, and September 1865-December 1866, list by date and customer the purchase of a wide variety of items including foodstuffs, fabric, books, clothing and shoes, and sundry home goods.

Samuel Shacklett was born in 1804, probably in Fauquier County, Virginia. By 1838 he had become a very successful businessman in Harrisonburg and in that year was elected a trustee of the city. He lived upstairs in a large brick house on the northeast corner of Court Square, with his store below in a space that would later be occupied by Fletcher drugstore. He also owned a frame building on Main Street, the lower floor of which he used as a wareroom; the upper story was called Shacklett's Hall and was used for church services by Old School Baptist and Episcopalian congregations. In 1860 Shacklett was named a commissioner of the Harrisonburg Savings Bank by an Act of Assembly. He died in 1886 and his son Henry continued the business for many more years.

Purchases of food, clothes, shoes, tools, household items, brandy, pills, turpentine, paper, tobacco, candy, books, and other items are documented with price, name of customer, and name of person who came for the articles. The name "Shacklett" is penciled in the front of the 1851-1852 and 1856-1858 daybooks; two slips of paper in the 1845 book carry the names John Dougherty and Geo. Bruffy, who may have been business partners. Many prominent Harrisonburg residents are listed as customers including Hardesty, Pennybacker, Harrison, Kratzer, Sprinkel, and Koontz.

Each daybook is bound and housed in two oversize boxes.

Wayland, John Walter. Men of mark and representative citizens of Harrisonburg and Rockingham County, Virginia; portraits and biographies of men and women. Staunton, VA: McClure Co., 1943.

Wayland, John Walter. A history of Rockingham County, Virginia. Dayton, VA: Ruebush-Elkins Co., 1912.