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159. Jourdan Moore Houston and Alan Fraser Houston. “Lithographer Henry Hitchings: Educator and ‘Early Devotee of Landscape Art.'” Vol. 26, no. 2 (Autumn 2001), 2-13.

Henry Hitchings (1823-1902) of Boston had a long career as an artist, printmaker, and art teacher and administrator. Recent discoveries of his works allow the Houstons to present his significant contributions and those of his Boston circle. In 1849 Hitchings became chief lithographer for the four-part series Landscape Sketches from Actual Views of New England Scenery. Hitchings lithographed some of his own drawings in this series designed to showcase the talents of members of the Boston Artists. Association. In 1859 he traveled with Albert Bierstadt and Seth Frost along the Oregon Trail, making sketches and watercolors, and eventually at least one lithograph. He may have also made photographs in the West. After serving as drawing master at the U.S. Naval Academy, in 1869 he began what would be a long career as an art teacher and administrator in the Boston schools, working with Walter Smith. Hitchings produced drawing texts, including Spencerian Drawing-Book No. 2 in 1871 and Landscape Studies in Sepia, published by Prang in 1876.

160. Wendy Shadwell and James Brust. “Unrecorded Currier & Ives.” Vol. 26, no. 2 (Autumn 2001), 14-18.

The authors present several newly discovered items produced by the various firms Nathaniel Currier established. First, the short-lived firm of Stodart & Currier lithographed a map of China dated 1834. In 1840 N. Currier lithographed the sheet music cover Tippecanoe, the Hero of North Bend, with a portrait of Whig party presidential candidate, William Henry Harrison. A Nathaniel Currier billhead from 1852 shows the firm.s sidelines included imported engravings and frames. Finally, a C & I portrait of Edward Stiles Stokes, murderer of James Fisk in 1872, is shown to be based on a Harper’s Weekly wood engraving from a photograph by “Kurz.”

161. Ron Tyler. “Illustrated Government Publications Related to the American West, 1843-1863.” Vol. 26, no. 2 (Autumn 2001), 19-31.

Tyler surveys the eighteen illustrated federal government publications relating to the West issued from 1843 to 1863-from Fremont’s first report on the Rocky Mountains to Lt. John Mullen’s Report on the Construction of a Military Road from Fort Walla-Walla to Fort Benton. They contain more than 1600 unique illustrations, and the size of editions ranged from 100 to 53,000. Tyler asks, and attempts to answer, four questions: Why did the government publish these pictures? How widely were they disseminated? What was their impact? And how did they affect the fledgling lithographic industry? Motivations ranged from the need for scientific and practical information to the desire to emulate European governments in publishing expedition reports, although some objected to the expense. Their impact was to acquaint a wide public with largely unknown regions and to encourage westward expansion.

162. David Tatham. “Winslow Homer’s General Giuseppe Garibaldi: An Unrecorded Harper’s Weekly Illustration.” Vol. 26, no. 2 (Autumn 2001), 32-33.

Tatham identifies a portrait of the Italian patriot General Giuseppe Garibaldi that appeared on the front page of the November 17, 1860, Harper’s Weekly as the work of Winslow Homer. It is signed with an elongated “H” similar to that used by Homer in several instances. The Weekly explained that the portrait was drawn from a photograph of a painting by Pagliano.