Bathing at Long Branch over the years

Unidentified artist, “An Every-Day Scene, Bathing at Long Branch New Jersey,” in The New York Illustrated News, August 15, 1863. Wood engraving. Oversize 0901.D389f

Henry Collins Bispham (1841-1882), “Our Summer Resorts, Bathing at Long Branch. Sketched by our special artist, Mr. Bispham” in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, September 12, 1863. Wood engraving. Annex A, Forrestal Oversize 0901.L637f. On the following page is a brief article accompanied this wood engraving:

“Long Branch has this year centered all the lovers of surf-bathing and all who gather around the fair lovers of the salt water. Cape May being no longer accessible, except by way of Philadelphia, does not compete with it, while at Long Branch every house was crowded to its utmost excess. Fashions change even in the matter of bathing and enjoying the sea air. Our clever artist gives Life at Long Branch as it appears A. D. 1863. The incidents, our readers will admit, are happy and happily treated. The introduction amid the roaring billows, the crab-catching, the lolling in the sand, and especially the bathing scene, all look so refreshingly cool, and bear such an impress of the dolce far niente, that they quite prevent our describing them in a hot city with sufficient appreciation. Imagination must supply our deficiency.”

John Karst (1836-1922) after Winslow Homer (1836-1910), “The Beach at Long Branch,” in Appleton’s Journal of Literature, Science and Art, August 21, 1869. Wood engraving. Recap AE5 .A675

After Winslow Homer (1836-1910), “Bathing at Long Branch, Oh, Ain’t t Cold,” in Century Magazine v. 3, New Series, August 26, 1871. Wood engraving. CTSN Eng 19 151170

J. L. Langridge (1800-1899), after Winslow Homer (1836-1910), “On the Beach at Long Branch, The Chldren’s Hour,” in Harper’s Weekly, August 15, 1874. Wood engraving. Rare Books (Ex) 2010-0005F

After Winslow Homer (1836-1910), “American Sketches: Bathing at Long Branch, New York
[New Jersey],” in The Illustrated London News 1875. Wood engraving. Recap Oversize AP4 .I458q

Ĉtyři básně

Thanks to Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Librarian Thomas Keenan, the Graphic Arts Collection has acquired this rare book of visual poetry by the experimental Czech writer Bohumila Grögerová (1921-2014). Entitled Ĉtyři básně (Four Poems), OCLC records only one other copy of this fragile volume in the United States.

Bohumila Grögerová and Alois Chvála, Ĉtyři básně ([Prague]: UB, 1965). “Upravil, vysadil a na ru čním lisu vytiskl Alois Chvála …”–Colophon. Graphic Arts collection GAX 2015- in process

http://www.ceskatelevize.cz/ivysilani/10121102744-cesko-jedna-basen/311295350080021-cesko-jedna-basen-bohumila-grogerova

See also: Vrh kostek : česká experimentální poezie / [editors, Josef Hiršal, Bohumila Grögerová ; Zdeněk Barborka … et al.] (Praha: Torst, 1993). Firestone Library (F) PG5025 .V74 1993

Daguerreotype of Thackeray

William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863) made his first lecture tour in the United States from late 1852 into 1853. While in New York City, he is known to have had a photograph made at Jeremiah Gurney’s Daguerrean Saloon located at 349 Broadway. Whether this small plate is by Gurney is doubtful. The daguerreotype was later engraved by H. Davidson and published in The Century Magazine (see below).

Published in Century Magazine v.82 (1911), engraved by H. Davidson.

Gurney’s Daguerreotype Saloon

Yankee Notions

The American illustrator John McLenan (1825-1865) moved to New York City in 1851 and within a year sold drawings to illustrate Baynard Rush Hall’s Frank Freeman’s Barber Shop; Sarah Josepha Buell Hale’s, Northwood, or, Life North and South; The Mother’s Pictorial Primer; and An Old Fogies Advice to a Young’un or the Politicians Guide to Office, published by Thomas W. Strong (1817-1892). When Strong began a new humor magazine in 1852 titled Yankee Notions, he hired McLenan to draw most of the caricatures. The journal lasted over fifteen years with a circulation of 47,000 at its height. In 1853 Strong added Young America to his publication list, again employing McLenan as the artist.

Throughout 1852 and all these publications, the young artist experimented with his artistic style and his public persona. For Freeman’s Barber Shop he used a pseudonym, Rush B. Hall, and for each of the caricatures in Yankee Notions, he signed his name with a different signature. See five versions here.

When McLenan died at the young age of 39, Strong praised his friend and colleague in Yankee Notions:

“When an unpretending man of genius passes away, simple and earnest words best befit his memory. Since our last issue, John McLenan, one of the best draughtsmen America has ever produced, has been numbered with the dead. . . .

We call the skillful artist and estimable citizen who has thus suddenly been snatched away, our friend, for the intimacy that existed between us was almost brotherly. . . .Genius rarely remains long unrecognized in this city, and soon after John McLenan took up his abode among us, shrewd publishers and a tasteful public discovered that he was no ordinary draughtsman. Equally at home in caricature and in sketches from the life, with a quick perception of the ridiculous and a fine appreciation of the picturesque, he soon took his place among the illustrators of our current literature, second to none. The Harpers employed him on their Magazine and Weekly, and also in the embellishment of their more permanent works, and his services were in request among other leading publishing houses.

Thus placed on the high road to distinction, the young artist would soon have found it the road to fortune, had not feeble health interfered with the exercise of his professional abilities.

…We miss his frank and hearty daily greeting, his manly candid face, his straightforward simplicity of heart, his trustful confidence in our advice and friendship. True friends are few and far between. They are rarer even than great artists, and John McLenan, in the genuine sense of that much abused word, was our FRIEND.” –IN MEMORIAM, Yankee Notions, May 1, 1865

Yankee-Notions (New York: T. W. Strong, 1853- ) Graphic Arts Collection (GAX) Oversize Hamilton SS 521q

Cuba, ca. 1850

After Frédéric Mialhe (1810-1881), Album pintoresco de la isla de Cuba ([Havana]: B. May y Ca., 1850-1853?). 27 chromolithographs, 2 maps. Graphic Arts Collection 2015- in process
Cover title: Album Pintoresco de la Isla de Cuba.

Frédéric Mialhe (1810-1881) arrived in Cuba in 1838 under contract to the printers Real Sociedad Patriótica to record views of the island. In the late 1840s, they published a set of chromolithographs under the title Viaje Pintoresco al Rededor de la Isla de Cuba.

In the 1850s, the work was pirated several times by the Berlin publisher Bernardo May, “who succeeded in defending himself against a breach of copyright suit by Mialhe and his Havana publisher Louis Marquier. Ironically May’s pirated edition guaranteed the availability of Mialhe’s well into the future for the original Havana edition is virtually unobtainable today.” It is one of the pirated editions that we have acquired for the Graphic Arts Collection.

Dia de Reyes. The Holy Kings Day.

Contents: 1. Morro y entrada puerto de la Habana; 2. Vista de la Habana; 3. Vista de la Habana : parte de Estramuros; 4. Haban; 5. Habana; 6. Habana; 7. Plaza de Armas; 8. Puertas de Monserrate; 9. Teatro de Tacon y parte del Paseo de Isabel II; 10. Fuente de la India en el Paseo de Isabel IIa.; 11. Alameda de Paula; 12. El quitrin; 13. El panadero y el malojero; 14. El casero; 15. Valla de gallos; 16. Dia de reyes = The holy kings day; 17. El zapateado = The zapateado (national dance); 18. Matanzas; 19. Morro y entrada del puerto de Santiago de Cuba; 20. Vista genl. de la ciudad y montañas de Baracoa; 21. Cercanias de Baracoa; 22. Vista de la iglesia major y de la Ermita del Buen Viaje; 23. Vivienda de los pescadores de esponjas; 24. Trinidad; 25. Corrida de toros; 26. Vista de una casa de calderas; 27. Vista de una vega de tabaco.

Vista General de la Ciudad y Montanas de Baracoa (Costa del Norte)

See also Emilio Cueto (born 1944), Mialhe’s Colonial Cuba: the prints that shaped the world’s view of Cuba (Miami: Historical Association of Southern Florida, 1994). Firestone Library (F) NE2325.5.M5 A4 1994

John McLenan

John McLenan (1825-1865), engraved by J. W. Orr, The Inauguration at Richmond, March 15, 1862. Wood engraving published in Harper’s Weekly

“John McLenan, an able man much ahead of his time,” wrote Arthur Hoeber, in A Century of American Illustration, “who drew in a much freer way than his confreres and whose technique was, for those days, quite astonishing. He was also a man of much inventiveness and is affectionately remembered by his fellow workers.” Although he has been forgotten by contemporary historians, John McLenan (also written McLennan) had a sparkling career in book and magazine illustration from 1852 to 1865, when he died at the age of 39. His designs for Harper’s Weekly can be distinguished by the floral initials in the lower left “J M C” or sometimes “J M L”.

Born in Philadelphia, McLenan grew up in Cincinnati. A story is often repeated that his talent was discovered one day while he was working in a meat packing plant, drawing on the tops of the barrels. In truth, McLenan was already publishing his designs while living in Cincinnati.

In 1862, the Cincinnati Enquirer commented, “[McLenan] gained considerable reputation as an artist long before he left us to take up his abode among strangers and many is the wood-cut he has furnished to adorn the columns of the Enquirer. He left here a few years ago to try his fortune in New York, and it was a fortunate stroke in his life. When he first went to New York, his designs brought only a few dollars, where they now command twenty-five to one hundred dollars. it is stated that he receives $5,000 a year from the Harper‘s and has the privilege of outside jobs.”

I am working on a longer piece about McLenan, if you have more information about his brief career.

Portrait of Elihu Spencer Sergeant, Class of 1804,

Unidentified Artist, Elihu Spencer Sergeant, 1787-1824, no date. Miniature painted on ivory. Princeton Portrait Collection no. 184. Graphic Arts GA 2005.00107. Gift of Jonathan Dickinson Sergeant, son of the subject, presented before 1907.

Elihu Spencer Sergeant, Class of 1804, was the son of Jonathan Dickinson Sergeant, Class of 1762, a member of the Continental Congress, and attorney-general of Pennsylvania. According to Donald Egbert, “Young Sergeant, whose mother was the daughter of the Rev. Elihu Spencer of Trenton, a trustee of the College of New Jersey, was born at Philadelphia on May 29, 1787, the eighth child and fifth son of his parents. He entered the College at Princeton, became a member of Whig Hall, and graduated high in his class in 1804, delivering the physical science oration at commencement. Admitted to the bar in Philadelphia in 1808, he practiced law in that city until his death on August 4, 1924 at the age of only thirty-seven.”

This image is slightly out of focus due to the heavy glass over the painted ivory surface. The frame might be contemporary to the portrait, although the thumbtacks holding it together are not.

50 / 50 funded

With one more day to go, the campaign to fund an exhibition and catalogue for the annual 50/50 book design competition has been successful.

Hosted by the Design Observer Group and sponsored by the American Institute of Graphic Arts, this is the 92nd year that 50 books and 50 book covers will be selected to represent the best work published. Originally only books produced in the United States were accepted but now, an international selection are considered.

In October, these books will be exhibited at the AIGA design conference in New Orleans. If you would like to help and receive a copy of the exhibition catalogue, you have a few hours left to log into kickstarter.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/designobserver/50-books-50-covers

For more information and to see the winners of last year’s competition: http://designobserver.com/5050-2014.php

Atrocious illustrations, for the purpose of making the enormity more noticeable.

New York Daily Tribune 23 Apr 1856

Transcription: “Benefit of Q. K. Philander Doesticks, P. B. respectfully tendered by himself to himself, in the hope that it will pay his small debts.

Doesticks will sing his new version of the Song of Hiawatha called Plu-ri-bus-Tah: a song that’s by no author, in Niblo’s saloon, some Saturday next year, if in the mean time a large and efficient orchestra of seven hundred persons can be trained to whistle the accompaniment.

Plu-ri-bus-tah, a book making most impertinent mention of a vast number of respectable persons it has no business to say anything about, is a Poem containing several hundred lines more than it ought to, willfully perpetrated with malice aforethought by Q. K. Philander Doesticks P. B., who has been aided and abetted in his intentional wickedness by John McLenan, Who has contributed thereto One hundred and fifty-four atrocious illustrations, for the purpose of making the enormity more noticeable.

The entire Poem has been set to music by the renowned author of “Villikins and his Dinah,” “Bobbin’ Round [Polka],” and our other purely American Operas, and will be sung in three flats, before a New-York audience by Doesticks, the author, who will make his first appearance on the operatic stage.

In order that the people may have ample opportunity to appreciate the pathos, the tenderness, and the inexpressible simplicity of the poetry, the public performance will not take place until considerable time after ten thousand copies have been sold, paid for, and the proceeds spent by the enterprising author.

This work will be issued on the first of May and the American People can gratify themselves, the writer, and the publisher, by making immediate application for early copies, for which they will be charged one dollar each.

To guard against speculators, no more copies will be sold to any one man than he can pay for. To avoid confusion in the tremendous rush for copies, wagons will enter the store at the Broadway entrance and having received their loads, will depart by the rear door. Handcarts and wheelbarrows not admitted. Apply at the box office of Livermore & Rudd, 310 Broadway.”

Q. K. Philander Doesticks (Mortimer Thomson, 1831-1875), Plu-ri-bus-tah. A song that’s by no author (New York: Livermore & Rudd, 1856). Comic history of the United States written in the style of Longfellow’s Hiawatha, Contains numerous illustrations, mostly in silhouette by John McLenan, engraved on wood by N.Orr, & Co. Graphic Arts Collection (GAX) Hamilton 1063

See also Q. K. Philander Doesticks (Mortimer Thomson, 1831-1875), Doesticks: what he says (New York: Edward Livermore, 1855). 8 full page illustrations by John McLenan, engraved on wood by N. Orr and S.P. Avery. Graphic Arts Collection (GAX) Hamilton 1054

The Charity Children

George Vertue (1684-1756), The View of the Charity Children in the Strand, upon the 7th of July, 1713, Being the Day Appointed by Her Late Majesty Queen Anne for a Publick Thanksgiving for the Peace . . ., 1715. Two engravings attached. Graphic Arts collection GA 2005.02092.

On July 7, 1713, approximately 4,000 children—girls on the left and boys on the right—filled the bleachers along the Strand to watch the procession for Thanksgiving Day for the Peace of Utrecht. This was one of several celebrations to mark the Treaty of Utrecht, which ended the War of Spanish Succession.The three-hour procession was led by Queen Anne from Parliament House to St. Paul’s.

According to the British Museum’s research, Vertue’s engraving was commissioned by Sir Richard Hoare (1709-1754), who was Lord Mayor at that time. Panoramic in scale, the two joined sheets measure 37.2 x 127.4 cm (just over 4 feet).

The inscription at the bottom continues: “when both Houses of Parliament made a Solemn procession to the Cathedral of St Paul. / By the care & provision of the Trustees of the several Charity-Schools in & about London & Westminster near IV thousand Charity Children Boys & Girls, being new cloathed were placed upon a Machine extended in length 620 feet, which had in breadth eight ranges of feats one above another: During the whole procession which lasted near three Hours, they sung & repeated the Hymns, which were prepared upon the expectation of her Majesty’s Royal Presence. The Like View of the Charity Children was presented to his Majesty King George, on the south side of St Pauls, when he made his Publick Entry into the City of London, upon the XX of September, MDCCXIV.”

“At the public thanksgiving for peace in 1713, the charity children were placed in rising rows of seats in the Strand to see the procession pass, and the Queen go to St. Paul’s to return thanks—and bitter must have been the disappointment of the little ones at the Queen’s absence, on account of illness.”–John Ashton, Social life in the Reign of Queen Anne, Taken from Original Sources… with eighty-four illustrations by the author from contemporary prints (London: Chatto & Windus, 1882) Firestone Library (F) DA495 .A82 1882

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