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- Title
- How can it be done?
- Description
- Image depicts a mob of slaveholders who are raiding an abolitionist press. Members of the mob are dragging off a broken printing press., Illustration in the Anti-Slavery Record (New York: Published by R.G. Williams, for the American Anti-Slavery Society, 1835-1837), vol. II, no. IX (September, 1836), whole no. 21, p. 1., Curator's note: This is one of several antislavery graphics depicting the proslavery assault on the antislavery movement and their demand for the suppression of antislavery literature. This and several other illustrations link antislavery agitation to first amendment freedoms., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Anti-Slavery Movement Imagery.
- Date
- [September 1836]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Per A 245 60026.D v 2 n 9 cover page, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2853
- Title
- [Pennsylvania Hall]
- Description
- Exterior view of the abolitionist meeting place and adjacent buildings at Sixth and Haines Streets in Philadelphia. Several white men and women pedestrians stroll the sidewalks. A carriage and horse-drawn cart pass by on the street. The hall, erected in 1838 as an arena for "free discussion," was set aflame by hostile mobs on May 17, 1838 after three days of interracial dedication ceremonies and services. The building ruins continued to stand until the Odd Fellows Society built a hall on the lot in 1846., Title from duplicate print., Attributed to John Caspar Wild., Probably printed by Wild & Chevalier., Probably after the wash drawing by architect Thomas S. Stewart., Possibly artist's proof., Published in: Samuel Webb's History of Pennsylvania Hall. (Philadelphia: Printed by Merrihew and Gun, 1838). (LCP Am 1838 Hist Pa Hall). Last page contains advertisement for a limited supply of larger frameable versions of the image to be sold at the Anti-Slavery Office, No. 29 N. 9th Street, Philadelphia., Philadelphia on Stone, POS 557, Accessioned 1982., Description revised 2021., Access points revised 2021.
- Creator
- Wild, J. C. (John Caspar), approximately 1804-1846, artist
- Date
- [1838]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department W274 [P.2158]
- Title
- [Pictorial lettersheet containing illustration of "Am I Not a Woman and Sister"]
- Description
- Illustration depicts the enslaved woman, bare-chested, kneeling on one leg, and holding up her chained hands as in prayer., Addressed to Mr. S. T. haulk [sic] Salburry [i.e., Salisbury] South Carolina., Inscribed: Advertised July 1st., Completed in manuscript from Thos. Wall, Granville, Ohio to "Dear Sir" on May 25, 1840. Reads: Dear Sir is this the way you th treat slaves - if so you had better set thith free and Let them go - the load be upon your head at the [bar?] of god. Then god Say all you an [sic] your slaves must come before god and then be juge [sic] at the Bar of god - Set the [?] free and Let he aogo [sic]. Let the slave go free - [?] and I am - Do you [sic] Work yourself., Illustration of a kneeling male slave is a variant of the image popularized by Josiah Wedgwood. Formed in 1787, the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade designed and adopted as its seal the image of a supplicant African male slave asking "Am I not a man and a brother?" That same year, Wedgwood, a ceramics manufacturer and member of the Committee, issued the image as a medallion, which was distributed in America. The image became a popular anti-slavery icon and was soon widely reproduced on artifacts and in print in the United States and in Britain. During the 1820s, a female counterpart with the motto “Am I not a woman and a sister?” was created by British abolitionists and quickly embraced in the United States, particularly among women abolitionists., Purchased with funds from the Albert M. Greenfield Foundation., Part of digital collections catalog through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education through the Office of the Commonwealth Libraries, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, Governor, 2013-2014., Purchase 2011., Access points revised 2021., Description revised 2021., Reason was an African American artist, engraver and lithographer working in New York City in the 1830s and 1840s.
- Creator
- Reason, Patrick Henry, 1816-1898, engraver
- Date
- [ca. 1835]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department GC - Allegories [16971.Q]
- Title
- Theodore Parker
- Description
- Bust-length portrait of the Boston Unitarian clergyman, social reformer, and abolitionist. Parker is attired in a white collared shirt, a black bowtie, and a black jacket and faces the viewer. Parker aided John Brown and was active in New England antislavery societies which provided shelter and legally defended freedom seekers, including William and Ellen Craft, the first enslaved Bostonians sought under the Fugitive Slave Law., Title from item., Date inferred from history of the engraver and attire of sitter., Accessioned 1982., Description revised 2021., Access points revised 2021., Part of digital collections catalog through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education through the Office of the Commonwealth Libraries, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, Governor, 2013-2014., Schoff, an engraver in Boston from the early 1840s until the 1860s, specialized in portraiture.
- Creator
- Schoff, Stephen Alonzo, 1818-1904, engraver
- Date
- [ca. 1855]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Portrait Prints-P [P.8911.751]
- Title
- Original & selected poetry &c
- Description
- Friendship album of Amy Matilda Cassey, a middle-class African American woman active in the antislavery movement and African American cultural community, containing contributions dating from 1833 until 1856. Contains original and transcribed poems, prose, and essays on topics including slavery, womanhood, religion, friendship, female refinement, death, and love. Also contains drawings, watercolors, and gouaches of flowers and a rustic, residential scene, possibly in New York. Contributors, including many women from the antebellum African American elite community, are prestigious reformers and abolitionists active in the anti-slavery, scholarly, educational, and cultural community of the antebellum North, including Philadelphia, New York, Boston, and Baltimore., Contains the following contributions: entry by African American abolitionist Frederick Douglass, dated Philadelphia 1850, about his "coarse" contribution in an album of "refined" entries; an original sonnet, "Fallen Bird," and essay, "The Abolition Cause," by anti-slavery activist, author, and editor, William Lloyd Garrison, dated Philadelphia 1833; floral watercolors and calligraphed poems by Philadelphia Quaker activist, educator, and artist Sarah Mapps Douglass; essay, "Moral Reform," dated Philadelphia 1834, by Harrisburg businessman and activist William Whipper; calligraphed version of Washington Irving's poem, "The Wife," by New York African American engraver Patrick Henry Reason dated New York 1839; poem about "Friendship" dated 1837 by anti-slavery activist Robert Purvis; prose on faith penned in 1853 by women right's activist and abolitionist Lucy Stone;, floral watercolors, poems and prose on friendship, womanhood, abolition, and remembrance by Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society associates Rebecca Buffum, Susan C. Wright, and sisters Hannah L. Stickney and Mary T. Stickney, and sisters Mary Forten (p.10), Margaretta Forten, and Sarah Forten Purvis, as well as their sister-in-law Mary Virginia Wood Forten (p.22); memorials to his deceased wife and daughter by Baltimore African Methodist Episcopal Bishop Daniel Alexander Payne written in 1849; and an essay by abolitionist Reverend Isiah George DeGrasse dated Bridgewater 1836. Additional contributions by Baltimore anti-slavery activist Emily Willson; anti-slavery activists Ann Warren Weston and Elizabeth Le Brun (Stickney) Gunn; Philadelphia barber and activist John Chew; abolitionist James Miller M'Kim; University of Glasgow trained activist James McCune Smith; Boston reformer Wendell Phillips; C.L.R., possibly Charles L. Reason, abolitionist and brother of engraver Patrick Henry Reason; A.W.H., possibly Quaker abolitionist Anna W. Hopper, and E.G., possibly Quaker abolitionist Elizabeth Garrigues., Also includes sketches and a poem by probably Lydia A. Bustill and unattributed watercolors and sketches possibly by Amy Matilda Cassey., Title from item., Inclusive range of dates inferred from entries inscribed with dates., Embossed and gilt morocco binding with blue moiré silk doublures., Lib. Company Annual Report 1998, p. 25-35., Research file available at repository., RVCDC, Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022., Cassey, an abolitionist, temperance and civil rights activist and founding member of the multiracial Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society and the African American literary and science society, Gilbert Lyceum, was the daughter of New York black community leader, Reverend Peter Williams. She was the wife of Philadelphia businessman and civil rights activist Joseph Cassey, and later married Boston anti-slavery lecturer Charles Lenox Remond.
- Creator
- Cassey, Amy Matilda, 1808-1856
- Date
- [ca. 1833-ca. 1856]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Amy Matilda Cassey album [P.9764]
- Title
- A view of Bassa Cove (in Liberia.)
- Description
- View "from a drawing made on the spot by Dr. Robert McDowall" of a village scene in Liberia, the African American colony established by the American Colonization Society in 1822. Also used as the illustration of a membership certificate of the Pennsylvania Colonization Society. In the left foreground, three bare-chested Black people, attired in white sarongs, stand at the West African cove across from the small village. The village is comprised of buildings and is surrounded by a fence. People and cattle stroll the grounds. Established in 1816, the controversial American Colonization Society promoted Black American emigration to resolve the problem of race inequality, and to dissolve the institution of slavery. Copies of the print were on view for sale at the colonization society office for over a decade. McDowall was a Black physician sent by the society to provide medical care at the colony., Title from item., Advertised in Colonization herald, June 17, 1837, vol. III, no. 54, p. 214 and later issues., Purchase 1970., Description revised 2021., Access points revised 2021., Part of digital collections catalog through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education through the Office of Commonwealth Libraries, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, Governor, 2013-2014., Lehman & Duval was a Philadelphia partnership between painter, lithographer, and engraver George Lehman, and lithographer, Peter S. Duval, that lasted from 1835 until 1837.
- Date
- [ca. 1836]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department *GC-Views-Foreign-Africa [7930.F]
- Title
- Official first day of issue. Honoring Harriet Tubman, 1821-1913. Abolitionist. Nurse. Escapded slave. Black Heritage USA Series
- Description
- ArtCraft "First Day Cover" (i.e., designed envelope with a stamp affixed and cancelled on the day the stamp was issued) containing vignette illustrations depicting Harriet Tubman. Shows a half-length portrait of Harriet Tubman and a view of Tubman with Black persons of all ages, their belongings, and horse-drawn carts on a snow-covered clearing., Title from item., Date supplied from research and content., Logo of printer printed in lower left corner: Text "ArtCraft" set on a paint palette with brushes inserted through the hole for the artist's thumb., Image caption: She Guided More Than 300 Slaves to Freedom., Contains ink-stamp postmark: Washington. DC. Feb 1 1978 20013 and cancelled "First Day of Issue" Black Heritage USA color-printed 15-cent stamp after the design of Jerry Pinkney and depicting a portrait of Harriet Tubman and an inset of a view of Tubman and three Black persons riding a donkey-drawn wagon. The Tubman stamp issued in 1978, was the first issued for the Black Heritage Series begun in 1978 by the U.S. Postal Service to recognize "the contribution of Black Americans to the growth and development of the United States.", Mailing label removed., The Washington Press ArtCraft brand was introduced in 1939 for the printing of First Day Covers. The firm stopped producing ArtCraft First Day Covers in 2016., Gift of George R. Allen, 2022.
- Date
- [1978]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department ephemera - envelopes - Poor [P.2019.80.6]
- Title
- Life in Philadelphia. Grand celebration ob de bobalition ob African slabery
- Description
- Racist caricature about free African Americans' celebratory response to the abolition of the African slave trade by the United States, an act passed in 1807 that took effect in 1808. Depicts a group of over fifteen well-dressed men sitting and standing and drinking, smoking, and making toasts around a large dinner table. A number of the men raise goblets and/or pipes in the air. Soup tureens are visible on the table. One man, standing, drinks from a rum bottle. In the far right, an attendee, in a wide-brimmed hat, carries away another who is unconscious, his tongue out, and holding a pipe. The men are attired in waistcoats with tails, pants and pantaloons, some striped, vests, and cravats. Some wear their hair in pompadour styles and one man has white hair. The biting toasts address "De Orator ob de day," William Wilberforce, a prominent British abolitionist; William Eustis, Governor of Massachusetts and the disgraced former Secretary of War under Madison; "De Sun" which should shine at night; Joseph Gales, a publisher and secretary of the American Colonization Society who believed that only states had the right to emancipate enslaved persons; "Ning Edwards;" "De Genius ob Merica;" the "White man" who wants to colonize blacks "now he got no furder use for him;" and "De day we Celembrate" and why it did not come sooner. Figures are portrayed with oversized and exaggerated features and their skin tone is depicted in black hand coloring. During the early 19th century, summer celebratory processions commemorating the anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade occurred annually in major Northern cities like Boston, New York, and Philadelphia., Title from item., Date inferred from content and name of publisher., Contains eight bubbles of dialogue in the vernacular within image: De Orator ob de day_When I jus hear him begin he discourse, tink he no great ting, but when he come to end ob um, I tink he like to scorch cat more better dan he took_Moosick_Possum up de Gum tree/Gubner Eustas Cleber old sole as eber wore nee buckle in de shoe_99 cheer and tree quarter/De Sun _Wonder why he no shine in de night putting nigger to dispense ob de candle./De day we Celumbrate! who he no come sooner? Guess de hard fros & de backward spring put um back. 29 pop gun v. 2 grin. White man _ mighty anxious to send nigger, to de place dey stole him from, now he got no furder use for him./De Genius de Merica _ He invent great many curious ting: wonder who just invent eating & drinking. 30 cheer & ober./Joe Gales _ He ax Massa Adams “if he be in health my brudder” and den he cut he guts out./Ning Edwards_ Guess he no great Angs no more nor udder people all he cut such a swell., P.2016.45.2 trimmed and lacking imprint., See LCP AR (Annual Report) 2003, p. 40-42., Shane White and Graham White's Stylin': African American Expressive Culture... (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998), p. 111. (LCP Ii 4, A2880.O)., Digital image shown is P.9709.3., P.2016.45.1 gift of Dr. Richard Dunn & Dr. Mary Maples Dunn., RVCDC, Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022.
- Creator
- Harris, I., engraver
- Date
- [ca. 1833]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Life in Philadelphia (London Set) [P.9709.3 & P.2016.45.2]
- Title
- Life in Philadelphia. Grand celebration ob de bobalition ob African slabery
- Description
- Racist caricature about free African Americans' celebratory response to the abolition of the African slave trade by the United States, an act passed in 1807 that took effect in 1808. Depicts a group of over fifteen well-dressed men sitting and standing and drinking, smoking, and making toasts around a large dinner table. A number of the men raise goblets and/or pipes in the air. Soup tureens are visible on the table. One man, standing, drinks from a rum bottle. In the far right, an attendee, in a wide-brimmed hat, carries away another who is unconscious, his tongue out, and holding a pipe. The men are attired in waistcoats with tails, pants and pantaloons, some striped, vests, and cravats. Some wear their hair in pompadour styles and one man has white hair. The biting toasts address "De Orator ob de day," William Wilberforce, a prominent British abolitionist; William Eustis, Governor of Massachusetts and the disgraced former Secretary of War under Madison; "De Sun" which should shine at night; Joseph Gales, a publisher and secretary of the American Colonization Society who believed that only states had the right to emancipate enslaved persons; "Ning Edwards;" "De Genius ob Merica;" the "White man" who wants to colonize blacks "now he got no furder use for him;" and "De day we Celembrate" and why it did not come sooner. Figures are portrayed with oversized and exaggerated features and their skin tone is depicted in black hand coloring. During the early 19th century, summer celebratory processions commemorating the anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade occurred annually in major Northern cities like Boston, New York, and Philadelphia., Title from item., Date inferred from content and name of publisher., Contains eight bubbles of dialogue in the vernacular within image: De Orator ob de day_When I jus hear him begin he discourse, tink he no great ting, but when he come to end ob um, I tink he like to scorch cat more better dan he took_Moosick_Possum up de Gum tree/Gubner Eustas Cleber old sole as eber wore nee buckle in de shoe_99 cheer and tree quarter/De Sun _Wonder why he no shine in de night putting nigger to dispense ob de candle./De day we Celumbrate! who he no come sooner? Guess de hard fros & de backward spring put um back. 29 pop gun v. 2 grin. White man _ mighty anxious to send nigger, to de place dey stole him from, now he got no furder use for him./De Genius de Merica _ He invent great many curious ting: wonder who just invent eating & drinking. 30 cheer & ober./Joe Gales _ He ax Massa Adams “if he be in health my brudder” and den he cut he guts out./Ning Edwards_ Guess he no great Angs no more nor udder people all he cut such a swell., Inscribed: No. 11., See Lib. Company Annual Report 2003, p. 40-42., Shane White and Graham White's Stylin': African American Expressive Culture... (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998), p. 111. (LCP Ii 4, A2880.O)., RVCDC, Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022.
- Creator
- Harris, I., engraver
- Date
- [ca. 1833]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Life in Philadelphia (London Set) [7510.F]
- Title
- Life in Philadelphia. Grand celebration ob de bobalition ob African slabery
- Description
- Racist caricature about free African Americans' celebratory response to the abolition of the African slave trade by the United States, an act passed in 1807 that took effect in 1808. Depicts a group of over fifteen well-dressed men sitting and standing and drinking, smoking, and making toasts around a large dinner table. A number of the men raise goblets and/or pipes in the air. Soup tureens are visible on the table. One man, standing, drinks from a rum bottle. In the far right, an attendee, in a wide-brimmed hat, carries away another who is unconscious, his tongue out, and holding a pipe. The men are attired in waistcoats with tails, pants and pantaloons, some striped, vests, and cravats. Some wear their hair in pompadour styles and one man has white hair. The biting toasts address "De Orator ob de day," William Wilberforce, a prominent British abolitionist; William Eustis, Governor of Massachusetts and the disgraced former Secretary of War under Madison; "De Sun" which should shine at night; Joseph Gales, a publisher and secretary of the American Colonization Society who believed that only states had the right to emancipate enslaved persons; "Ning Edwards;" "De Genius ob Merica;" the "White man" who wants to colonize blacks "now he got no furder use for him;" and "De day we Celembrate" and why it did not come sooner. Figures are portrayed with oversized and exaggerated features and their skin tone is depicted in black hand coloring. During the early 19th century, summer celebratory processions commemorating the anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade occurred annually in major Northern cities like Boston, New York, and Philadelphia., Title from item., Date inferred from content and name of publisher., Contains eight bubbles of dialogue in the vernacular within image: De Orator ob de day_When I jus hear him begin he discourse, tink he no great ting, but when he come to end ob um, I tink he like to scorch cat more better dan he took_Moosick_Possum up de Gum tree/Gubner Eustas Cleber old sole as eber wore nee buckle in de shoe_99 cheer and tree quarter/De Sun _Wonder why he no shine in de night putting nigger to dispense ob de candle./De day we Celumbrate! who he no come sooner? Guess de hard fros & de backward spring put um back. 29 pop gun v. 2 grin. White man _ mighty anxious to send nigger, to de place dey stole him from, now he got no furder use for him./De Genius de Merica _ He invent great many curious ting: wonder who just invent eating & drinking. 30 cheer & ober./Joe Gales _ He ax Massa Adams “if he be in health my brudder” and den he cut he guts out./Ning Edwards_ Guess he no great Angs no more nor udder people all he cut such a swell., Inscribed: No. 11., See LCP AR (Annual Report) 2003, p. 40-42., Shane White and Graham White's Stylin': African American Expressive Culture... (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998), p. 111. (LCP Ii 4, A2880.O)., RVCDC, Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022.
- Creator
- Harris, I., engraver
- Date
- [ca. 1860]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Life in Philadelphia (London Set) [P.9713.3]
- Title
- Life in Philadelphia. General order!!! Tention!! de whole city ob Philadelphia!! Philadelphia, Uly 14th 1825, 6 month and little more beside
- Description
- Racist caricature about free African Americans' summer celebratory processions commemorating the anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade by the United States, an act that took effect in 1808. Shows a Philadelphia street scene with an African American peddler and an African American shoe shiner. In the left, the peddler, attired in a wide-brimmed hat, waist coat with tails, and pantaloons carries a basket and exclaims, "Philadelphia Uly 14, 1825 & little arter." The shoe shiner, attired in a waistcoat and pants, holds a rack of boots and responds "That is de day ob de grand Celebrahsun." The men stand in profile. Also shows, in the background, two African American boys, attired in jackets and pants, facing the viewer, and one with his hands playfully raised in the air. Also contains several lines of text in vernacular and dialect addressed to "Peter Mink, de Chief Marshal ob de day, he Majesty de President” and “Per order Pompey Peterl, President and Snappo Gripes, Secretary" printed below the image. Text explicates the appropriate attire and manners expected during the celebratory procession, including "two sleebes to dare coat"; "trousaloon be all ob light complexion"; and "de Soulger dat know he duty always hold upun head like Lamb Tail an look savage like Meat Ax." Also details the punishment for "neglec to discomply," including "whip to death"; "fine of 40 shillings"; and placement in "de House of Destruction for Ninety nine years." Figures are portrayed with oversized and exaggerated features and their skin tone is depicted in black hand coloring., Title from item., Date inferred from content and name of publisher., Contains two bubbles of dialogue in the vernacular within image: “Philadelphia_ Uly 14 1825_ & little arter”/”That is de day of de grand Celebrashun”, Lib. Company. Annual report, 2003, p. 40-42., See Reilly 1825-1 for variant published in Boston., Added to African Americana Digital Collection through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education through the Office of the Commonwealth Libraries, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, Governor, 2013-2014., RVCDC, Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022.
- Date
- [ca. 1835]
- Location
- Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Life in Philadelphia (London Set) [P.2004.4]