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Title: The whitewasher
Description: Illustration shows a familiar Philadelphia character: a black, female whitewasher. The woman is dressed in work-clothes and coarse shoes; her sleeves are rolled-up and the illustrator emphasizes her muscular forearms. According to the accompanying text, the bucket on the floor contains a mixture of lime and water, with a little salt and indigo to make it clear. In the course of her work, the whitewasher dips long-handled brushes (like those seen here) into the mixture and rubs it onto the walls for cleaning., Illustration in City characters, or, familiar scenes in town (Philadelphia: Geo. S. Appleton; New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1851), p. 12., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Work Scenes.
Date: [1851]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1851 Cit 68429.D p 12, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2782

Title: The wood-sawyer
Description: Illustration shows a familiar Philadelphia character: a black wood-sawyer. As the text explains, "This is a hard occupation, followed generally by coloured people. They are old men, and have little ones to support, so that they have to work very hard." Shown in full profile, this mature wood-sawyer carries an axe in his hand and a "Horse" on his back. According to the text, when the wood-sawyer cuts his logs, he puts them on this "curious-four legged machine," which is "very strong, and made of oak or hickory wood." Holding the logs down with one knee, the wood-sawyer cuts off one piece at a time., Illustration in City characters, or, familiar scenes in town (Philadelphia: Geo. S. Appleton; New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1851), p. 96., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Work Scenes.
Date: [1851]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1851 Cit 68429.D p 96, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2785

Title: A free negress and other market-women
Description: Illustration accompanies Chapter III, "Province of Rio de Jainero." As the title suggests, it depicts a free negress (presumably the woman closest to the left) and three market women. A small child, not mentioned in the title, is visible at the far left. Sheltered by a small canopy, the four women sell fruits and vegetables: pineapples occupy a basket in the right foreground, melons and squash (?) are scattered on the ground, and two women balance baskets on their heads. Three large sacks contain additional market-goods, possibly beans. While it is ultimately unclear, the image appears to show a conflict between the negress and the market-woman seated on the bench., Illustration in James Henderson's A History of Brazil: Comprising its Geography, Commerce, Colonization, Aboriginal Inhabitants, &c. &c. (London: Printed for the author, and published by Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orne, and Brown, Paternoster-Row, 1821), p. 70., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Work Scenes.
Creator: Shoosmith, C., artist
Date: [1821]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare *Am 1821 Hender 1814.Q p 70, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2724

Title: The laundress
Description: Illustration shows a familiar Philadelphia character: a black laundress. She is neatly dressed in a long, flowing skirt; and her head is covered with an untied bonnet. "This woman," as the accompanying text explains, "is engaged by rich people to wash and iron clothes, which have been soiled by wearing." The text continues, "The woman in the picture looks as though she had just finished a hard day's work and was taking clothes home to the owners; she what a large basket she carries. It is full of articles of clothing neatly folded up; and this shows how much the woman has done in one day.", Illustration in City Characters, or, Familiar Scenes in Town (Philadelphia: Geo. S. Appleton; New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1851), p. 32., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Work Scenes.
Date: [1851]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1851 Cit 68429.D p 32, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2783

Title: The rag-picker
Description: Illustration shows a familiar Philadelphia character: a black, male rag-picker. He wears a coarse, loose-fitting smock, trousers, and a cap. He carries a basket fastened to a stick over his shoulder and a hooked instrument in his hand. The accompanying text explains, "You see him with his hooked stick exploring heaps of rubbish, and carefully selecting whatever he finds which may be turned to good account, and storing all away in his basket.", Illustration in City characters, or, familiar scenes in town (Philadelphia: Geo. S. Appleton; New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1851), p. 80., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Work Scenes.
Date: [1851]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1851 Cit 68429.D p 80, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2784

Title: "The auctioneer's young man"
Description: This portrait is included in Chapter X, "A Visit to Houston," where it accompanies the section "Types from Negro-Life." The engraving depicts the auctioneer's "young man," a black man carrying a bell and a flag that reads "AUCTION SALE." Describing him and other Houston "types", King wrote: "The street life is interesting; the negro on his dray, racing good-humoredly with his fellows; the ragged urchin with his saucy face and his bundle of magnolia-blossoms; and the auctioneer's "young man," with his mammoth bell and brazen voice, are all interesting types, which, as the reader will observe, the genial and careful artist has faithfully reproduced." (p. 116), Illustration in Edward King's The great South: a record of journeys in Louisiana, Texas, the Indian territory, Missouri, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, and Maryland (Hartford, CT: American Publishing Company, 1875), p. 116., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Scenes from Daily Life.
Creator: King, engraver
Date: [1875]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1875 King 3379.Q p 116, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2827

Title: Scene in a Lynchburg tobacco factory
Description: Illustration is included in Chapter LXI, "A Visit to Lynchburg in Virginia," and corresponds with the following passage, which clearly aims to present the tobacco factories in a positive, and even romantic light: "It [Lynchburg] has thirty-five tobacco factories, employing great numbers of negroes, men, women, and children. These negroes earn good wages, work faithfully, and turn out vast quantities of the black, ugly compound known as "plug," which has enslaved so many thousands, and promoted such a sublime disregard for the proprieties in the matter of expectoration. . . . In the maufacturies the negro is the same cheery, capricious being that one finds him in the cotton or sugar-cane fields; he sings quaintly over his toil, and seems entirely devoid of the sullen ambition which many of our Northern factory laborers exhibit. The men and women working around the tables in the basements of the Lynchburg tobacco establishments croon eccentric hymns in concert all day long; and their little children, laboring before they are hardly large enough to go alon, join in the refrains." (p. 556) Correspondingly, the engraving shows four small children stripping tobacco leaves alongside the adults., Illustration in Edward King's The Great South (Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company, 1875), p. 557., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Work Scenes.
Date: [1875]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1875 King 3379.Q p 557, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2828

Title: Emancipated slaves can take care of themselves
Description: At the left, the illustration depicts a free black man, or a "paid" laborer. He works vigorously with a hoe, and is dressed in a suit and top hat. At the right, a slave, or an "unpaid" laborer, is shown. He also works with a hoe, but unlike his counterpart, he is barely dressed, and looks weak and despondent., Illustration in the American Anti-Slavery Almanac, for 1839 (New York: Published for the American Anti-Slavery Society, 1838), p. 21., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Anti-Slavery Movement Imagery.
Date: [1838]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare Am 1838 Ame Ant 16996.D.3 p 21, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2765

Title: Alms House in Spruce Street Philadelphia
Description: Street scene on Spruce Street between Tenth and Eleventh streets with a view of the Almshouse and House of Employment, built after the designs of Philadelphia architect Robert Smith, in 1767. In the foreground, three men capture a pig escaped from a nearby horse-drawn cart transporting swine. The Alms House provided shelter to indigents incapable of labor, while the House of Employment housed the poor able to work. The inmates predominately manufactured textiles. The houses were razed in 1835, superseded by the Blockley Almshouse in West Philadelphia., Retrospective conversion record: original entry, edited., Illustrated in S. Robert Teitelman's Birch's Views of Philadelphia (Philadelphia: The Free Library of Philadelphia, 1982, rev. 2000), pl. 25.
Creator: W. Birch & Son
Date: 1799
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Birch's views [Sn 25/P.2276.58]

Title: Alms House in Spruce Street Philadelphia
Description: Street scene on Spruce Street between Tenth and Elevenths streets with a view of the Almshouse and House of Employment, built after the designs of Philadelphia architect, Robert Smith, in 1767. In the foreground, three men capture a pig escaped from a nearby horse-drawn cart, transporting swine. The Alms House provided shelter to indigents incapable of labor, while the House of Employment housed the poor able to work. The inmates predominately manufactured textiles. The houses were razed in 1835, superseded by the Blockley Almshouse in West Philadelphia., Print trimmed., Retrospective conversion record: original entry, edited., Illustrated in S. Robert Teitelman's Birch's Views of Philadelphia (Philadelphia: The Free Library of Philadelphia, 1982, rev. 2000), pl. 25.
Creator: W. Birch & Son
Date: [179[9]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Birch's views [Sn 25/P.2276.59]

Title: [Artist's study for Alms House in Spruce Street. Philadelphia]
Description: Street scene on Spruce Street between Tenth and Eleventh streets with a view of the Almshouse and House of Employment, built after the designs of Philadelphia architect Robert Smith in 1767. In the foreground, human figures capture an animal figure escaped from a nearby horse-drawn cart. The Alms House provided shelter to indigents incapable of labor, while the House of Employment housed the poor able to work. The inmates predominately manufactued textiles. The houses were razed in 1835, superseded by the Blockley Almshouse in West Philadelphia., Title from plate 25 in the first edition of Birch's "Views of Philadelphia.", Retrospective conversion record: original entry, edited., See Martin Snyder's "William Birch: His Philadelphia Views," The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 73 (July 1949), p. 271-315.
Creator: Birch, William Russell, 1755-1834, artist
Date: [ca. 1799]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department drawings & watercolors - Birch - Alms House [P.9329]

Title: [Men working on the roadside, Pocono Lake, PA]
Description: Photograph showing a group of seven men with shovels and axes working on the side of a dirt road at Pocono Lake. A horse-drawn wagon stands on the road behind the men. All of the men wear shirts with rolled sleeves. Some men wear hats, ties, or suspenders. The Pocono Lake Preserve was pioneered by a group of Quakers, including Isaac Sharpless, who camped in the area in 1904. In 1908, this group bought the property from the Pocono Mountain Ice Company and designed it as a basic, rustic campground., Photograph from negative number P.2013.13.370., Digitization and cataloging has been made possible through the generosity of David Marriott Morris, Eleanor Rhoads Morris Cox, and William Perot Morris in memory of Marriott Canby Morris and his children: Elliston Perot Morris, Marriott Canby Morris Jr., and Janet Morris and in acknowledgment of his grandchildren: William Perot Morris, Eleanor Rhoads Morris Cox, Jonathan White Morris, and David Marriott Morris., Edited.
Creator: Morris, Marriott Canby, 1863-1948, photographer
Date: July 27, 1909
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department Marriott C. Morris Collection [P.2013.13.620]

Title: Loading a Mississippi steamer, New Orleans U.S.A
Description: Scene showing a steamship, named New Orleans, pulled up to a wooden dock covered with barrels and sacks. African American men carry sacks up gangplanks to the ship. In the foreground, an African American man lies on his stomach across a pile of sacks. Several men stand near him., Title from item., Date inferred from content and photographic medium., View is numbered 188 in a series., Purchase 1998., Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022., Digitization funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (PW-506-19-10), 2010-2012.
Date: [ca. 1920]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department stereo - unidentified - work [P.9600.14]

Title: Cars loaded with cotton bales on levee near cotton growing district, Texas
Description: Scene showing a group of African American men using hand trucks to move large bales of cotton into or out of freight cars. In the left are stacks of baled cotton with two men standing on top of the bales. In the center, lines of men hold hand trucks of cotton, some turn and look at the viewer. In the right are open freight cars. A bridge and buildings are visible in the background., Title from item., Date inferred from content., Copyrighted by Underwood & Underwood., View is numbered P-V22091, the V indicating it was originally part of stereograph publisher and distributor, Underwood & Underwood's stock. An additional number- P215 indicates what position the stereograph had within a set. Pedagogical text printed on the verso reads "Freight cars loaded with cotton bales on the levee near cotton growing district, Texas...", Purchase 1998., Description revised 2022., Access points revised 2022., 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., Keystone View Company was founded in 1892 by B.L. Singley, an amateur photographer from Meadville, Pennsylvania. Keystone View Company was the leader in promoting stereographs for educational purposes. In 1912, the company purchased rights to some Underwood & Underwood negatives for use in educational sets, and in 1922 purchased the remaining stock of Underwood materials. The company remained in business until 1970.
Creator: Keystone View Company, publisher
Date: [ca. 1920]
Location: Library Company of Philadelphia | Print Department stereo - Keystone - Work [P.9600.12]

Title: View of the city of Philadelphia, and its principal buildings
Description: Print containing a central panoramic view of Philadelphia surrounded by vignettes of prominent Philadelphia institutions. View looks west from Camden, New Jersey, showing islands and vessels in the Delaware River. Vignettes include the Almshouse, Fairmount, Girard College, Merchants' Exchange, Moyamensing Prison, Chestnut Street Theatre, U.S. Naval Asylum, State House, U.S. Mint, and the University of Pennsylvania. Most vignettes include small details like carriages, horses and pedestrians on foot., Philadelphia on Stone, Atwater Kent Museum: 40.14.19
Creator: Kollner, Augustus, b. 1813, artist
Date: 1842
Location: Atwater Kent Museum | Print Department AKM AKM 40.14.19

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