Alabama State Artillery Company, Mobile Militia, from the Military Series (N224) issued by Kinney Tobacco Company to promote Sweet Caporal Cigarettes 1888

This chromolithograph of the Alabama State Artillery Company was made by the Kinney Brothers Tobacco Company as a promotional item for Sweet Caporal Cigarettes. It’s one of a series of military figures produced in the late nineteenth century. Consider the culture that made it, the American South, roughly twenty years after the Civil War. Nostalgia for the Confederacy was common and found expression in popular imagery. This card participates in that phenomenon, evoking a sense of southern pride and military tradition. But the image doesn't only appeal to the South. The United States was busy reinventing itself as a unified nation in this period. These cards may have helped to fashion a sense of national identity by celebrating military history and the symbols of state power. To understand its full meaning, we might research military histories, advertising ephemera, and the popular culture of the late 1800s. The meaning of art can change so much, as the social and institutional contexts shift over time.