1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Mercantile Agencies

MERCANTILE (or Commercial) AGENCIES, the name given in America to organizations designed to collect, record and distribute to regular clients information relative to the standing of commercial firms. In Great Britain and some European countries trade protective societies, composed of merchants and tradesmen, are formed for the promotion of trade, and members exchange information regarding the standing of business houses. These societies had their origin in the associations formed in the middle of the 19th century for the purpose of disseminating information regarding bankruptcies, assignments and bills of sale. The mercantile agency in the United States is a much more comprehensive organization. It came into existence after the financial crisis of 1837. Trade in the United States had become scattered over a wide territory. Communication was slow, and the town merchant was without adequate information as to the standing of many business men seeking credit. Undoubtedly the severity of the collapse of 1837 was due in part to the insufficiency of this information. New York merchants, who had suffered so severely, determined to organize a headquarters where reports regarding the standing of customers could be exchanged. Lewis Tappan (1788–1873), founder of the Journal of Commerce (1828) and a prominent anti-slavery leader, undertook the work, and established in New York, in 1841, the Mercantile Agency, the first organization of its kind. The system has been wonderfully developed and extended since.