The Carpet-Bag, Vol. II, No. 24

The Carpet-Bag's ornate nameplate features a hand gripping the masthead above scrollwork and two vignette woodcuts—left shows figures at a table; right depicts a street scene. The central image presents a railroad depot on Middlesex Street, Lowell, rendered in precise engraved style.

Founded in 1851 by Benjamin Penhallow Shillaber, The Carpet-Bag was a Boston weekly devoted to humor, burlesque, tall tales, and light verse. It occupied a distinct niche between serious periodicals and sensational crime sheets, publishing comic sketches and literary satire aimed at educated readers. The paper became a launching ground for American humorists: Mark Twain's "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" appeared here first, as did early work by Artemus Ward. Shillaber's own character Mrs. Partington—a garrulous elder woman commenting on current events—exemplified the paper's approach: domestic comedy grounded in recognizable American life and dialect.