Illustrated trade card of George Brown, baker, 2 Queensferry Street, Edinburgh, 19th century

George Brown’s delightful trade card prominently displays his shop in the foreground on the corner of Queensferry Street in the west end of Edinburgh, with St John’s Church, Edinburgh Castle and the Caledonian Hotel in the background. His business had both a bread baking department and a confectionary and cooking department. Amongst his specialities were ‘viennoise boulangerie’ ‘pitkeathly bannocks’ and ‘aerated bannocks’. Master bakers in Scotland, such as George Brown, trained many apprentices, who, when their time was done, often went south to London in search of work. 

Credit: Crown copyright, NRS, GD136/1340 (Link to the Online Catalogue entry)