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Title: Illustrations of Philadelphia. Vol. IX
Description: Scrapbook containing newspaper clippings, prints, and ephemera predominately dated 1857 and pertaining to the built environment, and social, cultural, and economic climate of Philadelphia. Majority of the contents are articles about city businesses and industries; public interest stories; editorials relating to public concerns and social mores; reports, lists, and statistics; and caricatures and cartoons. Several articles concern the new house numbering system; the chartering of Fairmount and Sedgeley parks; the Academy of Music (New Opera House), including the inaugural ball and first opera season; the temporary relocation of the Post Office; progress of Camden; volunteer fire companies, including the debate over the oldest instituted, new fire houses, and parades; fires on the 300 and 600 blocks of Chestnut (i.e., Peterson/Goodyear building and Melodion); transportation, including omnibus lines and the Camden and Atlantic, and Philadelphia and Baltimore Central railroads; and the new coinage of cents issued from the mint. Also contains numerous columns about building dedications, laying of cornerstones, and improvements and new construction to the city’s infrastructure, including Drown’s Umbrella Manufactory (86 Market); the silver plated ware establishment of John O. Mead (Ninth and Chestnut); the Butler house lot (800 block Chestnut); the hall of the "Colored Masons"; the Spring Garden district and Northwestern section of the city (Twelfth, Thirteenth, and Fifteenth wards); the Pennsylvania Bank building; First Welsh Presbyterian Church (1500 Lombard); the Penn Widow’s Asylum; Washington building (000 block S. Third); and the restaurant of John Campbell (500 block Chestnut)., Other articles describe the Library Company’s receipt of the ca. 1720 Peter Cooper painting of Philadelphia; culture, politics, and economy of the year 1856; local medical schools and hospitals, including Penn Medical University, Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia small-pox hospital, and Eclectic Medical College; local industries and trades, including Wood & Perot's ornamental iron work establishment, Newell & Knight barrel making machinery and the oyster trade; and Moyamensing Prison. Anecdotal columns and editorials provide commentaries about Philadelphia Insurance companies; Aprils Fools Day; servants; tramps; the city’s “noisy spot” of Third and Chestnut; the lore of stage coaches; popular catch phrases, including those from the theater; the Molly Maquires; the public expense of public lamps and paupers; the importance of newspapers, including as a more perfect venue for advertising than storefront signage; the poor use of the language in classified advertisements; storefront and tavern signages (p.41-42); and the cricket mania. Also contains historical pieces about the University of Pennsylvania; Independence Square; Chew’s Mansion; Zion Lutheran Church; and the Chinese Museum; reports, lists and statistics detailing the crime and mortality rate, sales of stocks and real estate; the retail, cattle and produce markets, meteorology and weather, telegraph use for the year, the comparative health of manufacturing cities, and architectural improvements in progress; a column about how the 1785 city directories represented the population of the city from the series "Philadelphia As It Was"; and an illustrated article about shawls., Graphics, predominately caricatures and cartoons, include lithographs, engravings, and wood engravings. Majority of cartoons satirize the hoop skirt, including the Clara and Charles series. Other cartoons satirize German beer culture, patent medicine, P.T. Barnum, and the social mores of the upper classes. Caricatures, often racist, depict African Americans while at work, including a sweeper, cook, and painter. Prints also include advertisements, vignettes, and views. Advertisements depict the Union hotel (300 block Arch); Thornley & Chism, importers, jobbers and retailers of fancy & staple dry goods (N.E. cor. Spring Garden and Eighth); Lincoln, Wood & Nichols, manufacturers and importers of straw goods; and Fairbank’s patent platform scales. Vignettes depict a knife cleaning apparatus, Olmstead stove, and a piano. Views show a genre scene titled by Poulson "An ‘omnibus’ sleigh and a 'rung' "; the Academy of Music; Jefferson Medical college, Presbyterian Church; Central Presbyterian Church; and "The Performing Elephants" at the National Circus accompanied by the classified for the performance. Scrapbook also contains ephemera, including the "Deaf and Dumb Alphabet" chart inscribed "In use at Phila Institution 1857 as per report Jany 1858" ; a "Premium medal, Franklin Institute"; and two elaborately illustrated tickets to the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society., Majority of contents annotated by Poulson with dates and explicative manuscript notes., Title page trimmed and illustrated with a ca. 1856 lithographer's advertisement issued by Wagner & McGuigan after the work of lithographer Maurice Traubel and artist William Croome. Depicts an allegorical, patriotic scene with the figure of Columbia, attired in a toga, American flag, and laurel wreath, and with a broken shackle under her foot as she stands on a pedestal., Chart "Length of Squares East and West" pasted on verso of title page., Label inscribed "The "Articles" in the book are taken from fugitive sources only; and the dates affixed to each are those of the newspapers &c from which they were procured CAP" pasted on verso of front free end paper., "Index to set in back part of vol. XI.", Insert: “Report of the President of the Girard College to the committee on Instruction September 3, 1850, Cataloging funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (PW-506-19-10), 2010-2012.
Creator: Poulson, Charles A. (Charles Augustus), 1789-1866, compiler
Date: 1857-1858
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Poulson scrapbooks - vol. 9 [(9)2526.F]

Title: Sketches of character. Plate 2. At home. Plate 3. Abroad
Description: Racist caricature contrasting two scenes of the same African American couple "At Home" and "Abroad." The "At Home" scene depicts the couple in their kitchen with a wood floor washing dishes together. In the right, the woman, attired in a kerchief, short sleeves, apron, skirt, and slip on shoes, is bent over and washes the dishes in a tub on a stool. In the left, the man, barefoot and attired in a shirt with the sleeves rolled up, vest, bow tie, and pants, sits on the edge of a butcherblock table on top of which a pile of dishes rests, and dries one. The man and woman look at each other. In the background, on the wall, cooking utensils, pots and pans, and a slab of bacon hang from hooks underneath a shelf lined with cook and dishware near a large woven basket, a cupboard, and a small shelf with two bottles. The "Abroad" scene depicts the pair well attired and about to promenade down a city street, possibly Philadelphia and from near Independence Hall. The woman wears a large plumed bonnet with a veil and a ribbon tied under her chin, a blue cape over a dress giving her the appearance of a bell, and gaiter-like shoes. Her husband wears spectacles, a top hat, white shirt, yellow vest, black waist coat, grey pants, and yellow gloves. He holds a walking cane down toward the ground in his left hand and his other arm out to his companion. A guardhouse is seen in the right and the edge of a building (possibly Independence Hall) in the left. Cityscape is visible in the distant background. Figures are portrayed with oversized and exaggerated features and their skin tone is depicted in brown hand coloring., Title and date from item., Copy right secured., Lib. Company. Annual Report, 2013, p. 51., Purchased with the Davida T. Deutsch African American History Fund., RVCDC, Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022.
Creator: Clay, Edward Williams, 1799-1857
Date: January 12, 1830
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Life in Philadelphia (Philadelphia Set) [P.2013.74]

Title: Illustrations of Philadelphia. Vol. X
Description: Scrapbook containing newspaper clippings and prints predominately dated 1858 and pertaining to the built environment, and social, cultural, economic, and political climate of Philadelphia. Majority of the contents are articles about city businesses, industries, and municipal services; public interest stories; editorials relating to public concerns and social mores; and reports, lists, and statistics. Subjects include the operation of the fire department, including the introduction and trials of steam fire engines, the discontinuation of fire bells, and the yearly report of the “Fire Detective”; the City Passenger Railroad, including its commencement, progress and improvements to the city, and the auction of former omnibus horses at Herkness’s Auction House; balls, parades, lectures, and other forms of entertainment, including the questionable protocols of the minor theatres, horse racing in Chestnut Hill, and the opera season at the Academy of Music; fashion, including histories of the red petticoat and crinolines, hoop skirts, and satires about style and cost; the prison system, including Eastern State Penitentiary and corruption; the Great Comet and Blizzard of 1858; the removal of the market sheds and increasing the value of properties on Market Street; the inauguration of the Schuylkill Navy; and the economic state of shad fishing and fisheries, the oyster trade, dairy owners, ice dealers, paper manufacturers, and dentists., Several articles also report about city construction, improvements, and renovations. Sites referenced include businesses on downtown Chestnut Street and in South and North Philadelphia (Bailey & Co., silverware; Levy & Cox, retail dry goods store; Caldwell & Co., jewelry; the Butler House Hotel; John McClure, stationery store; John Fuss, lager beer); Church of the Incarnation, and Pine Street Presbyterian and Tabernacle Methodist Episcopal churches; Hunting Park; and the new market house (Sixteenth and Market). Editorials address the institution of a city ordinance against public smoking; the daily inhabitants of the State House Square and Custom House steps; the plight and nuisances of city street beggars, fortune tellers, gamblers, and organ grinders; and the heavy use of opium by Americans. Additional articles discuss Christmas, including retail store windows adorned for the holiday; events and activities of local organizations, including the Washington Monument Association, American Systematic Beneficence Society, American Veterinary Association, and the Newsboys’ Aid Society; auctions by M. Thomas & Sons, including the Howard Tilden estate, the wine cellar of the late Joseph Gratz, and oil paintings sold below market value; the closing of the Jones Hotel; proposal by city commissioner James M. Leidy for the creation of ward maps to aid city development; histories of the 12 1/2 Society and Hurst Mansion; the exercise mania; lost and found advertisements; the “fogyism” and “favoritisim” of the Franklin Institution mechanical exhibitions; and views of historic landmarks and the Hope Hose Company by photographers James McClees (p. 57) and Walter Dinsmore (p. 102)., Reports, lists and statistics detail mortality and crime rates; the domestic, flour, produce, hay, cattle, and pork markets; the weather for the week, season, and year; real estate and stock sales; churches in the city; taxes; the public schools; fire companies; current town topics; and “Local” and “Noteworthy” events, fires, and railroad and steamboat accidents for the year. Also contains the “Annual Message of the Mayor” reporting on the state of the city and classifieds for patent medicines and entertainments, including fortune tellers, the National Circus, and balls and parties attended, according to Poulson, by “firemen, apprentices boys, new boys, gamblers and fancymen" who are the " ‘efficient beaus’ " of the factory girls, milliners, shop girls etc."… on the occasions.” Ephemera includes a “Ticket of Admission to ‘Franklin Hall’ " for the Heenan & Jones Sparring Exhibition., Scrapbook also contains graphics including an albumen print, engravings, wood engravings, trade cards and cameo stamps. Comic and advertising vignettes, caricatures, and advertisements predominate as genres. Comic vignettes include many satirizing the fashion of large hoop skirts. Other vignettes satirize the new police uniform, gentlemen’s collars, the Irish, and African Americans ("Baker-street beauties"). Non-satiric vignettes show predominately home furnishings and wares, including silver utensils and serving ware, boxes for papers and deeds, a wire dish cover, coffee pots and kettles, pudding moulds, perforated nursery lamps, serving platter, and a double oven cooking stove. Caricatures (some hand-colored) depict burglars (annotated by Poulson as “ ‘fair hits’ at…the inconsiderable folly of the ‘compassionate’”); "The City Inspector," i.e., a street rag picker; the crude manner of men “on the balconies in front of the ‘gentleman saloons’”; a ‘Schuylkill Ranger’ and “chocker’ gang member; “A Juvenile Party” annotated as "A fair hit at precosity [sic]"; Kris Kringle; and comparisons of country and city doctors, store-keepers, and belles., Advertisements include views of " 'Sharpless’ new store on the N.W. cor. of Chestnut and Eighth Street (Butler property)' "; Crystal Building, F.H. Smith, forte monnaie, pocket book, & dressing case manufacturer (Fourth and Chestnut); Barnes cough syrup establishment (333 Chestnut); Giovanni & Oliver, wholesale fruit store (248 Market); Bailey & Co., British sterling silver ware (819 Chestnut); Perry & Erety, booksellers, binders & stationers (Fourth and Race); Warnick & Leibrandt, Philadelphia Stove Works & Hollow-Ware Foundry (First Wharf above Noble Street); Girard House ( 800 block Chestnut); Henry O.B. Banks, paint and glass store (400 block Callowhill) French, Richards & Co., wholesale, drug, paint & glass warehouse (1000 block Market); M’Daniels & Fort, saddlery, hardware & coach trimmings (101 N. Third); Wright, Hunter & Co., plumbers and gas fitters (900 Walnut); Moore’s Porter & Ale Brewery (1300 block Fitzwater); Anspach, Jacoby & Co., dry goods (Third and Cherry); J. Thornley’s India Rubber Emporium (311 Chestnut); John C. Keller, stove manufacturer (Ridge Avenue and Willow Street); St. Lawrence Hotel (1000 block Chestnut); Merchant’s Hotel (000 block N. Fourth Street); Mansion House (1000 Market); and Weymer & Brothers, dealers in warm air furnaces, stoves, and ranges & c. (1000 block Coates). Graphics also depict a photographic reproduction of a daguerreotype of the moon, a hand-colored illustration showing lady’s "Winter Fashions," and an illustration of "Lalla Rookh, The Tight Rope Elephant" annotated “exhibited at ‘Dan Rice’s great show’ … 29th of March 1858.” Many of the advertisements include street and pedestrian traffic and merchandise displays., Majority of contents annotated by Poulson with dates and manuscript notes, particularly social commentaries., Title page illustrated with a ca. 1856 lithographer's advertisement issued by Wagner & McGuigan after the work of lithographer Maurice Traubel and artist William Croome. Depicts an allegorical, patriotic scene with the figure of Columbia, attired in a toga, American flag, and laurel wreath, and with a broken shackle under her foot as she stands on a pedestal., Front free end paper contains Poulson inscription: "The "Articles" in the book are taken from fugitive sources only; and the dates affixed to each are those of the newspapers &c from which they were procured CAP." Inscription framed with cut out containing filigree and an eagle. Clipped vignette of a pointed finger also pasted on page., "Index to set in back part of vol. XI.", Artists, engravers, printers, and publishers include Calvert & McClaine, Robert Crump, M’laughlin Bros, J.B. Neagle, E. Rogers, J. Spitall, and J.W. Steel., Cataloging funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (PW-506-19-10), 2010-2012.
Creator: Poulson, Charles A. (Charles Augustus), 1789-1866, compiler
Date: 1857-1858
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Poulson scrapbooks - vol. 10 [(10)2526.F]

Title: A dead cut
Description: Racist caricature portraying a middle-class African American man-woman couple as snobs who slight a working-class African American man shoeshiner and former acquaintance. Depicts the African American shoeshiner greeting the African American couple who feign ignorance of the man's acquaintance after their return from "de Springs." The laborer, attired in a rumpled top hat, torn overcoat with tails, and patched pants holds his rod of boots in his left hand, and uses his right one to grab the hand of "Cesa." "Cesa," dressed in a flat-top cap, and heavy, long overcoat with handkerchief in the pocket, and plaid pants, looks suspiciously at their joined hands. He holds a walking stick and his companion's parasol in his other hand. He states that the shoeshiner has mistaken his identity (You must be mistaking in de person black man!). His companion, her hand around his elbow, and dressed in a Dunstable bonnet, dark-colored overcoat, and button-down shirtwaist with a collar, agrees. With her hand placed on her hip and holding a purse, she declares, "What does the imperdent nigger mean?" Figures are depicted with oversize and exaggerated features., Sarah Hart was a Jewish Philadelphia stationer who assumed printing of the "Life in Philadelphia" series in 1829. She reprinted the entire original series of 14 prints in 1830., Pendelton, Kearny, & Childs, in operation from 1829 until 1830, was the first successful lithographic firm in Philadelphia. The firm's partners were John Pendleton, Frances Kearny, and Cephas G. Childs., Nancy Reynolds Davison's E.W. Clay: American Political Caricaturist of Jacksonian America (PhD. diss., The University of Michigan, 1980), p. 80-81. (LCP Print Room Uz, A423.O)., Described in Daily Chronicle, December 26, 1829, 2 and “The Dead Cut,” Philadelphia Inquirer, December 31, 1829, 2., RVCDC, Description revised 2021., Access points revised 2021., Acquired in 1970.
Creator: Clay, Edward Williams, 1799-1857, etcher
Date: 1829
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Life in Philadelphia (Philadelphia Set) [7893.F.1]

Title: [Life in Philadelphia miniatures]
Description: Five cartes-de-visite size racist and sexist social caricatures derived from the series "Life in Philadelphia," including figures in brightly colored and ornately patterned fashion. Lines of dialogue are included below the images. Depicts a scene of a white man sexually harassing a white woman, their fashion caricatured (P.9717.1); a thwarted celebration of the election of Andrew Jackson centered on an African American man and boy portrayed in caricature (P.9717.2); a discussion of hot weather between an African American man and woman portrayed in caricature (P.9717.3); a dance ball centered on an African American man and woman portrayed in caricature ((P.9717.4); and the purchase of silk stockings by an African American woman portrayed in caricature (P.9717.5). The prints are captioned respectively: "Good Evening Miss..."; "Why for you hurrah for General Jackson?"; "How you find yourself dis hot weder Miss Chloe?"; "Shall I hab de honor to dance de next quadrille...?"; and "Have you any flesh colored silk stockings...?" The scenes also contain detailed backgrounds that include cityscape, pedestrian traffic, figures at celebration, bucolic scenery, the interior of a ballroom with white attendees, and the interior of a clothing store attended by a white man clerk speaking with a French dialect. The African American figures are portrayed with exaggerated features and stances. The white woman figure is portrayed with an exaggerated silhouette because of her fashion comprised of a bell-shaped overcoat and dress., Title supplied by cataloguer., Date inferred from content., P.9717.1 contains lines of dialogue below the image: Good evening Miss, shall I have the pleasure of walking with you._ Me Sir!! for whom do you take me, Sir?_ Come that’s a good one!-for whom do I take you? Why for myself to be sure., P.9717.2 contains lines of dialogue in the vernacular and dialect below the image: Hurrah! Hurrah for General Jackson. Why for you hurrah for General Jackson – you black Nigger – I’ll larn you better – I’m a ministration man., P.9717.3 contains lines of dialogue in the vernacular and dialect below the image: How you find yourself dis hot weder Miss Chloe? Pretty well I tank you Mr. Cesar, only I aspire too much., P.9717.4 contains lines of dialogue in the vernacular and dialect below the image: Shall I habe de honour to dance next Quadrille wid you Miss Minta. Tank you Mr. Cato wid much pleasure only I’, engaged for de next nine Set!”, P.9717.5 contains lines of dialogue in the vernacular and dialect below the image: Have you any Flesh color’d Silk Stockings young Man? Oui Madame! Her is von pair of de first quality., RVCDC, Description revised 2021., Access points revised 2021.
Date: [ca. 1833]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Life in Philadelphia (London) [P.9717.1-.5]

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