For years I've had the Degas painting, Cotton Exchange, posted on this website. The painting was done in my home town of New Orleans, a major cotton center and port. Degas spent parts of 1872 and 1873 in the city. The painting shows men examining cotton samples at a large table, presumably to make decisions regarding large purchases of cotton for industrial buyers, both domestic and overseas. Others in the painting are individually examining cotton samples, reading a newspaper, or engaging in other cotton trade functions.
It is possible that one or more of the men in the painting were conducting business on behalf of Gassner & Company, a Liverpool-based cotton merchant. I'm no expert in the tax laws of 1898, so I am not sure of the exact types of taxes this $1 stamp might have paid. However, Gassner would have been active buyers, warehousers, and shippers of cotton. The process, likely including exchanging pounds for dollars, would have involved taxable events. If the stamp was still on its document, the use of the stamp would be clear. But for now, we have an interesting relic of the cotton trade in New Orleans.
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