A real good girl wanted at once, by a steady man in the North-West Territory (1886)

Lower class (masculine)1886

A real good girl wanted at once for matrimonial purposes, by a steady man, in the North-West Territory. Never mind looks, so long as the heart is in the right place. Marriage to come off in about 30 days. Address, Box 1011, Matrimonial Journal Office, Toronto.

The Anglo-American Matrimonial Journal, Toronto, Vol. 1, No. 1, December 1886, p. 3. View the original page on Canadiana

In plain English

A dependable man living in the North-West Territories wants a good woman to marry, as soon as possible. Her looks do not matter to him, as long as she is kind-hearted, and he would like the wedding to take place in about 30 days.

Who wrote it, and to whom

Newspaper	The Anglo-American Matrimonial Journal, Toronto
Date	December 1886 (Vol. 1, No. 1), page 3
Section	Lower class (masculine), at one cent a word
Written by	A man in the North-West Territories, unsigned
Addressed to	Women willing to marry soon
Where	Replies to Box 1011, Matrimonial Journal Office, Toronto

Context

The Anglo-American Matrimonial Journal was a paper of marriage ads, run from an office in Toronto. Canadiana, the Canadian Research Knowledge Network’s digital collection, holds one issue: Vol. 1, No. 1, December 1886. Its ads are sorted by class and sex, and the price rose with the class: a cent a word for the lower class, two for the middle and three for the upper. Replies went to numbered boxes at the Journal’s office, and a few box numbers are printed twice.

In 1886 the North-West Territories took in most of what are now Alberta and Saskatchewan, and the Canadian Pacific Railway across them had been finished the year before. Two ads up the same column, a Toronto carpenter asks for “a strong healthy girl from the North-West Territory.” The box number printed with this ad, 1011, is also printed with the ad just above it, from a young Toronto mechanic. For where people in Calgary and Edmonton post personal ads now, see our guide to personal ads in Canada.

In the Personals Dictionary

Matrimonially inclined Box, care of the office

Tagged

matrimony written by men

How to cite this ad

“A real good girl wanted at once, by a steady man in the North-West Territory.” Matrimonial advertisement, The Anglo-American Matrimonial Journal (Toronto), vol. 1, no. 1, December 1886, p. 3. Transcribed in The Personals Archive, AseeksB, https://www.aseeksb.com/archive/1886-matrimonial-journal-north-west-territory-real-good-girl.html.

Public domain: published in 1886.

Transcribed from the page image on Canadiana and checked against the original; spelling and punctuation are as printed, and words broken across lines are rejoined.

← 1886: Maggie, 25, would like a professional gentleman of moderate means 1886: A man of 35 begins to feel kind of lonely-like →

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