Library Company of Philadelphia
Happy #publishersbindingThursday, #feathursday edition! We love the gold stamping almost as much as we love the marbled cloth! Swoon!
C.W. Webber. Wild Scenes and Song-Birds. New York: George P. Putnam & Co., 1854.
We were going to share this for #TypeTuesday, but then remembered that today is Wednesday. Y indeed.
Initial Letter from Benjamin Franklin’s Experiments and observations on electricity, made at Philadelphia in America…London: Printed for David Henry; and sold by Francis Newbery, at the corner of St. Paul’s Church-Yard., MDCCLXIX. [1769]
#OnThisDay in 1877, Hunkpapa Lakota chief Tatanka-Iyotanka, or Sitting Bull, led his troops to Canada after the Battle of Little Bighorn. After staying there for four years, Sitting Bull returned to the Standing Rock Reservation in South Dakota. He later went on to join Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show.
Sitting Bull, Sioux Chief, ca. 1870. Albumen on carte-de-visite mount. From American Celebrities Album.
In keeping with our series imagining how historic artists in their collection might “takeover” our social media platforms, we’re featuring Moses Williams, an early African American artist who lived and worked in Philadelphia.
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“Today I’m sharing with you all a silhouette of myself from the early 1800s. I grew up in the home of Charles Willson Peale, and like his many children, I was trained to work at the Peale Museum as a silhouettist. My dexterity with this artistic process became so profitable that I was able to marry and buy a home after gaining my freedom. In addition to bringing large crowds to the museum, my silhouettes have both provided me with freedom, independence, and an outlet for my creativity."
Moses Williams, Cutter of Profiles, ca. 1803. Silhouette.
The Reading Rooms may be closed, but that wont stop us! The LCP staff have been busy creating some great content, so stop by our blog to see what’s new. You’ll find more pandemic reading from Jim (small pox! yellow fever!), more pudding from Katie (blackberry with fairy butter!), a new podcast, and a Redrawing History update (webinar!)
To mark the end of National Poetry Month, we are sharing this lovely little publishers binding which adorns a a copy of the Philopoena, a popular gift book of poetry compiled by Rufus Griswold. The cloth cover was once a vibrant purple (mauvine), but over the decades has faded significantly.
Griswold, Rufus W. The Philopoena, or Poetry of the Affections. New York : Leavitt & Allen, 1853.
We’re submitting this beautiful illustration as a last minute contribution to #NationalGardenMonth and a reminder to go outside if you can, the flowers are in bloom.
Showing off my latest baked creation like…
Image depicts two girls gathered around a table picking at a large plate of sweets.
We hope it’s not too late to throw our hat in the ring for the #CreepiestObject challenge!
The Library Company received this mummy’s hand in 1767 as a gift from the famed American painter, Benjamin West. It is now held in our Art & Artifacts collection.
The top of the box has an inscription that reads, “Woman’s Hand taken from an Egyptian Mummy: presented to the Library Company of Philadelphia by Mr. Benjamin West formerly of this City, but now of London - Historical Painter - November 1767.”
The Library Company was the largest medical library in colonial America, thanks in part to the collections of James Logan and his brother Dr. William Logan, but also a wealth of other medical treatises and plague-related material - including a copy of Defoe’s 1722 Journal of the Plague Year.
In the second of a multi-part series of pandemic reading, Librarian Jim Green muses on some of the plague literature on our shelves, including Benjamin Rush’s medical library. Check it out on the blog!