Hochschild, Kohn & Co-Baltimore

Hochschild, Kohn & Co, established in 1897 in Baltimore, Maryland, were a major department store, presumably counting top quality wooden jigsaw puzzles within their retail product range. They are also now known to have operated a Rental Library for jigsaw puzzles, probably introduced c1929-1930 in response to declining sales of such expensive items and the subsequent increased popularity of jigsaw puzzles during the early years of the Great Depression, when cardboard jigsaw puzzles were beginning to appear as a more affordable alternative to hand-cut wooden puzzles. See the Tuck's Zag-Zaw plywood puzzle A Mosque in Cairo for further details and also The Glory of Rubens, the second example of which carries dated rental information from 1932/33.