Project Gutenberg has the 1912 version of Clement C. Moore’s Twas the Night Before Christmas illustrated by Jessie Wilcox Smith. The Santa is more elf like….short, very round…and not dressed in red and white! A little perspective on how the vision of Christmas has changed over the last 100 years….
I discovered an edition of A.A. Milne’s A Gallery of Children with illustrations by Henriette Willibeek LeMair (Saida) – one of my favorite illustrators of the era. It was published in 1925 and is available from Project Gutenberg. I picked three illustrations from the book to include with this post…but follow the link to the book to find many more.
She was most active as an illustrator in the early 1900s. I posted about 4 books she illustrated back in August 2021. It was a thrill to find another. According to her entry in Wikipedia, in 1920 she married and converted to Sufism…publishing sporadically thereafter.
I browsed 3 books written by A. A. Milne from the early 1920s available on Project Gutenberg and Internet Archive last month. They were all before the Winnie-the-Pooh books although two of them contain material that later became part of the books that made Milne famous.
A Gallery of Children illustrated by H. Willebeek Le Mair (1925) is my favorite of the group because of the illustrator. I posted about 4 other books she illustrated by in August 2021; she’s one of my favorite illustrators of the early 1900s.
Once Upon a Time illustrated by Charles Robinson (1922) was written in 1915…before the birth of Christopher Robin at a time when ‘life was not very amusing.’ It was published at the end of 1917. Milne commented that ‘I am still finding it difficult to explain just what sort of book it is.’
When we were very young (1924) is dedicated to Christopher Robin Milne (or Billy Moon as he prefers to call himself). He was born in 1920. The Internet Archive book does not include illustrator’s name; the A. A. Milne entry in Wikipedia lists E.H. Shepard (Punch cartoonist).
Palmer Cox (1840-1924) was a Canadian illustrator and author who created a series of Brownie books (humous verse books with comic drawings of mischievous but kind-hearted small creatures). His creations were so popular that one of the first hand-held cameras was named after them (the Eastman Kodak Brownie camera). His unique house in Quebec was named Brownie Castle. The characters are in individual costumes, sometimes very stereotypical…but they work together on their endeavors. The books depict positive interactions of very diverse individuals! The plaque on his tombstone reads: In creating the Brownies he bestowed a priceless heritage on childhood.
I browsed 6 Brownie books over the past couple of months – freely available on Internet Archive/Project Gutenberg.
I found and browsed 5 books illustrated by Alice B. Woodward in June. They are all freely available on Internet Archive or Project Gutenberg.
The first one I found was published in 1895: Eric, Prince of Lorlonia, Or, The Valley of Wishes: A Fairy Tale of the Days of Chivalry. It is one of her earliest books.
She became a prolific illustrator in the early 1900s. The other 4 books are from that period. The illustrations are richly colored….full of detail…enhancing the story the book is telling.
The Brownies and other Tales by Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing in 1910
The Pinafore Picture Book by W.S. Gilbert in 1908
The Story of Peter Pan Picture Book by Daniel O’Connor in 1915
The Story of the Mikado by W.S. Gilbert in 1921
She continued to work into the early 1930s so there could be additional books that become more accessible as the copyright expires.
Heinrich Schliemann was a pioneer in the field of archaeology focusing primarily on pre-Hellenistic archaeology. His techniques were often destructive by today’s standards but that is often the case with pioneers in the field. He did publish his finds and I browsed through 3 of them back in May - all freely available. I’ve selected a few images from each of the books.
The Book of the Mycenae (1877)
Is that the back part of a crane on the right side of the pot? The three disks give me ideas for Zentangle tiles. Two of them are clearly nature based – an octopus and a bee.
Ilios : the city and country of the Trojans (1880)
The simplicity of the gold bracelets…I wondered if people wore them all the time once they put them on or if they were items were only worn intermittently. The decoration on the whorls – another source of Zentangle patterns. It’s appealing when a culture has the practice to make ordinary objects into art.
Tiryns; the Prehistoric Palace of the Kings of Tiryns, the results of the Latest Excavations (1886)
(Use the arrows to move through the three sample images to take a closer look). This is the only book of the three that has color images…using it effectively to depict the fragments of wall painting with the whole pattern derived from the fragments. The fragments of vases were complete enough to have meaning on their own. The terracotta idols appeared to be mostly women!
I posted about Sir Arthur Evans a few weeks ago. He was another pioneering archaeologist with some overlap with Schliemann; Evans took over the excavation of Knossos after Schliemann’s plan to do so ended with his death.
Dorothy P. Lathrop was a prolific illustrator (and sometimes writer) of children’s books from 1919 to 1967. Some of the books she illustrated very early in her career are available online now that they are old enough to be out of copyright and I am featuring 4 of them in this week’s eBook post with some sample images from each one.
Down-Adown-Derry: A Book of Fairy Poems by Walter De La Mare (1922) I picked sample images because I liked the botanicals – dandelion puffs and Indian pipes.
A Little Lost Boy by William Henry Hudson (1920) Do you recognize the birds? Flamingos, roseate spoonbills, (maybe) osprey.
Grim: the story of a pike by Svend Fleuron (1921) More birds: heron and terns and osprey!
It will be a treat when more of her work becomes available…with the passage of time/copyright.
Project Gutenberg has the 1885 edition of Bret Harte’s The Queen of the Pirate Isle with illustrations by Kate Greenaway. I was looking at it more for the illustrations than the text since I was working my way down the list of books she illustrated. She set a style for children’s clothes in her illustrations (see the Wikipedia entry for her and then look for the books in the ‘Books Illustrated’ list in Internet Archive…it’s a good way to look at the work of an illustrator when the works are old enough to no longer be under copyright). She died in 1901 so books are out of the copyright window.
For girls – the clothes seem more for ‘dress up’ play that for everyday activity. I’ve clipped 6 images from the book to provide a flavor of the book….and Kate Greenaway illustrations of children.
I found a book published in 1896 – made available on Project Gutenberg – that is prompting a project: Gobolinks by Ruth McEnery Stuart and Albert Bigelow Paine.
The book has a short introduction describing how to create the images (folding a paper…putting blots of ink on one side then closing the paper to create the ‘shadow’ side) and then some poetry about what the images ‘look like’ – goblins or insects or birds on a wire (lots of opportunity for imagination).
I decided to try some of my own gobolinks…using some food coloring that has been in the cabinet so long it had dried out completely. I rehydrated it and made a first attempt with some printer paper. Dropping the color from the food coloring bottles made huge, dark blobs!
After a few days, I decided to try again with some lightweight cardboard/card stock tiles that I could later overlay with a Zentangle pattern. I folded them in different ways.
My plan was to make a drop of food coloring and then moved the color around with a toothpick before closing the fold. I quickly realized that the lightweight cardboard absorbed the food coloring very quickly (glad I had a newspaper layer underneath). The others turned out reasonably well although the color is very dark. I’ll use the white gel pen when I overlay the patterns.
And I’ll dilute the color next time I make some Gobolink tiles!
The illustrations in Children of our Town were done by Ethel Mars and Maud Hunt Squire….showing children as they were in towns and cities in 1902. The verses were written by Carolyn Wells and link the book to New York (i.e. a city) where it was published. Still – it’s interesting to browse the pictures and think about how reflective these images are of children of that era.
There are several indications that these were children of people that were well off:
they are always wearing shoes even in warm weather,
they are often at places that would have cost money (a merry-go-round, a zoo, an excursion boat),
they have equipment like skates and toys,
sometimes the adult with them appears to be a nanny or maid.
1902 is an interesting year in my perception of the time since my grandfathers were born in 1901 and 1903. Their situation would have been very different since they were not living in a city or town; they were part of a rural population that had enough to eat because they grew food but were generally challenged for things they couldn’t produce themselves. One of my grandfathers talked about going barefoot all the time as a child and also an instance where he fashioned shoes for himself out of shoe boxes when it was very cold. They also were more involved in the work of the farm as soon as they were old enough to gather eggs or pull weeds or scare birds away from the garden. Whatever toys they had were ones they (or their parents) made from materials available to them (bark boats for the creek, clay from the creek bank, etc.). I wondered if they had marbles like the city children.
(Note - There is a version of Stevenson’s A Child’s Garden of Verses illustrated by the same artists available from Project Gutenberg published in 1928. It’s interesting to see how the work of these artists evolved over time.)
Mowing leaves. I made a first mulching of leaves on our yard. The oak and sycamore are beginning to drop their leaves and those leaves are big enough to form mats if they are not mowed to bits at the right time. From now on the mowing will be more about leaves than grass!
Winding down in the cutting garden. There are fewer flowers in the CSA’s cutting garden. I cut fewer this week.
At some point I’ll be making very different kinds of bouquets – may some amaranths and seed pods. The stevia and fennel had the tops cut off (appeared like it was done just a few hours before I got there) so I gathered the clippings that were on top of the remaining plants and have the stevia clipped and drying on a tray. The fennel seed heads are still in a bag. I haven’t quite figured out how to handle them.
The cooler temps mean that we have lettuces again. We got two single-salad size lettuces this week and they look almost like flowers (and are edible)!
There were only 7 botanical print books in January because I shifted focus to volumes about shells last month. I finished up the ‘Illustrated dictionary of gardening’ volumes…enjoyed the drawings in a botany textbook by Asa Gray…marveled at how different woods look at the micro level. The last two books (Familiar Trees) are from a series that I found back in 2015…but somehow I only looked at one of the three volumes then.
The volumes are all freely available on the Internet. The whole list of more than 1800 books can be accessed here. Sample images and links for the 7 new ones are provided below. (click on the sample image to see a larger view) Enjoy!
The Illustrated dictionary of gardening Division IV Law to Odo * Nicholson, George (editor) * sample image * 1887
The elements of botany for beginners and for schools * Gray, Asa * sample image * 1887
Wood; a manual of the natural history and industrial applications of the timbers of commerce * Boulger George Simonds * sample image * 1908
Popular botany; the living plant from seed to fruit V1 * Knight, Alfred E.; Step, Edward * sample image * 1913
Popular botany; the living plant from seed to fruit V2 * Knight, Alfred E.; Step, Edward * sample image * 1913
Familiar Trees with colored plates - third series * Boulger, George Simonds * sample image * 1907
Familiar Trees with colored plates - first series * Boulger, George Simonds * sample image * 1907
Starting out the new year…I selected 3 books with an art and history skew from my accumulation of reading this month.
Dillon, Edward. Glass. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons. London: Methuen and Co. 1907. Available from Project Gutenberg here. The book is a history of glass (up until the early 1900s) with illustrations of pieces in museum collections. I paid more attention to the illustrations than the text. I’ve always been interested in ancient glass because it points to the step beyond basketry and pottery in our manufacturing expertise. It a material we think about as being ‘breakable’ but is often very enduring.
Whitney, Frederick. Blackboard Sketching. Springfield, Massachusetts: Milton Bradley Company. 1909. Available from Internet Archive here. Written at a time when many students were learning to write and draw with blackboard slates and slate pencils…it provides an idea of how students were taught. Early classrooms used a lot less paper!
LaFontaine, Bruce. Bridges of the World Coloring Book. Dover Publication. 1994. Available from Internet Archive here. The bridges are organized chronologically. The sample image I show below is the colored version (as the end page of the book) of page 10…a bridge from China built about 1100. The book includes short descriptions the design features and technologies the bridge builders utilized. Obviously, these bridges have proven to be very durable.
Enjoy these 3 online books!
Whitehouse, Eula. Texas Wildflowers in Natural Colors. 1936. Available from Project Gutenberg here.
This was my favorite botanical book for March….and maybe beyond that too. Eula Whitehouse lived from 1892-1974 and spent the latter part of her career in Dallas – working at Southern Methodist University from 1946 until her retirement; her books and collections are the core of what became BRIT (Botanical Research Institute of Texas). She assisted in organizing the Dallas County Audubon Society in 1954.
The book was self-published first in 1936 and remains a favorite among many Texas botanists. It was published privately and distributed through the Texas Book Store in Austin and then, in 1948, through Cokesbury Bookstore in Dallas. The version available online at Project Gutenberg shows both dates. I’ve included a few sample images below.
I grew up in Texas and found myself wondering why the nature day camps I attended during my elementary and middle school summers didn’t use her book as a reference as we tried to learn about the wildflowers we saw around us.
Eula Whitehouse published a study on the evolution, or succession, of plant communities at Enchanted Rock (in Texas) as part of her doctoral research at the University of Texas in the 1930s. In the late 1970s, Lady Bird Johnson urged The Nature Conservancy to purchase Enchanted Rock to be set aside for posterity. I like that there is a linkage via Enchanted Rock between Eula Whitehouse and Lady Bird Johnson – two women that were deeply involved in preserving wildflowers of Texas.
For more information about Eula Whitehouse, see pages at BRIT and Texas State Historical Association.
Twenty-two botanical print books added to the list in March! Enjoy the carousel of the 22 sample images today and all the links to the volumes below! I’ll provide more information on some selections in the next couple of days. The complete list of all the botanical books I’ve found online, can be found here.
Icones Plantarum V27 * Hooker, Joseph Dalton; Hooker, William Jackson * sample image * 1901
Icones Plantarum V28 * Hooker, Joseph Dalton; Hooker, William Jackson * sample image * 1901
Icones Plantarum V29 * Hooker, Joseph Dalton; Hooker, William Jackson * sample image * 1901
Texas Flowers in Natural Colors * Whitehouse, Eula * sample image * 1936
Field and Woodland Plants * Furneaux, William S. * sample image * 1909
100 Desert Wildflowers in Natural Color * Dodge, Natt N. * sample image * 1963
The Flower-fields of Alpine Switzerland * Flemwell, G. * sample image * 1911
Mycologia V1 1909 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1909
Mycologia V2 1910 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1910
Mycologia V3 1911 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1911
Mycologia V4 1912 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1912
Mycologia V5 1913 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1913
Mycologia V6 1914 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1914
Mycologia V7 1915 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1915
Mycologia V8 1916 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1916
Mycologia V9 1917 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1917
Mycologia V10 1918 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1918
Mycologia V11-12 1920 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1920
Mycologia V14 1922 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1922
Mycologia V15 1923 * Murrill, William Alphonso (editor) * sample image * 1923
Plates and descriptions of new and rare plants from southern India and Ceylon V1 * Beddome, R.H. * sample image * 1874
Plates and descriptions of new and rare plants from southern India and Ceylon V3 * Beddome, R.H. * sample image * 1874
As usual – I tried to select some different kinds of books that are available for free to peruse online. This month they are from three different sources too: Hathi Trust, Internet Archive, and Project Gutenberg. Maybe one of these is something you would enjoy too…so take your pick - history or art or children’s literature!
Country Life in America. New York: Doubleday, Page, & Co. 1901-1917. Hathi Trust has 31 volumes of the periodical available here. Most of the magazine is black and white but there is some color like these three pictures from the December 1904 issue. The advertising is as interesting as the pictures with articles…it is a snapshot of the time: technology, food, special occasions, travel.
Rebay, HIlla. Third enlarged catalogue of the Solomon R. Guggeneheim collection of non-objective paintings: March 7th until April 17th, 1938, Gibbes memorial art gallery, Charleston, South Carolina. New York: Bradford Press. 1938. Available from Internet Archive here. Lots of colored images in this book since it was from an exhibition of ‘modern’ art of the 1920s and 1930s. The two below are by Rudolf Bauer.
Greenaway, Kate. Mother Goose or the Old Nursery Rhymes. London: Frederick Warne and Co. 1881. Available from Project Gutenberg here. Familiar Rhymes…fun illustrations. This author created imaginary 18th-century clothes for children that became a style for actual clothes for children!
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Celebrating the whole of life....
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