We just acquired approximately 63 (including several duplicates) glossy 8 x 10″ professional photographs of turkeys from Max M. Lyons’ turkey operation.  Lyons was famous for developing the 100% Broad Breasted Bronze, arguably the most popular turkey in American at that time (1930s).  He started in the turkey business with his father-in-law in 1912, and over the years developed several new hybrids; he was a constant exhibitor at state fairs and poultry congresses, winning many awards.

Shown here is a noble profile of the bird that Benjamin Franklin apparently favored for use as our national bird (some theorize that he was being facetious).  In any case–it’s a face for radio, as they say.

Why, you may ask, has the Watkinson acquired this archive?  One of the lesser known subsets of our famous ornithology collection deals with the breeding and raising of poultry, and so here we are.

My favorite image in the archive is of a young lady in a rather graceful crouch among a teeming field of turkeys, all destined, no doubt, for the dinner table . . .

Tags: New Acquisition

Gabriele Falloppio (1523-1562) & Volker Coiter (1534-1576).  Lectiones de partibus similaribus humani corporis, ex diversis  (Nuremberg, 1575).  

I acquired this from an antiquarian bookseller in New York, and at some point before that firm owned the book, it was on the shelves of the Library of the Medical and Chirurgical Faculty of Maryland (what is now the Maryland State Medical Society–for its history, see here: http://www.medchi.org/about-medchi/history).

This is a scarce edition of a series of anatomical lectures by Falloppio in their first published appearance, including two tracts by Coiter on the osteology of quadrupeds and birds, illustrated with 5 large engraved plates of mammal, reptile, amphibian and bird skeletons after Coiter’s own drawings. Two texts from the present work are of particular interest for the history of anatomical science: “Coiter’s study of the skeleton of the foetus and of a child six months old, [which] was the first study of developmental osteology and showed where ossification begins” (Garrison & Morton), as well as the treatise “De avium sceletis et praecipuis musculis,” which includes in table form the first classification of birds by species.   The five large plates of animal skeletons that conclude the volume were apparently inspired by the Italian naturalist Aldrovandi.   “Coiter’s illustrations,” says one authority, “most of which he etched himself, are far superior in quality to the zoological illustrations of Aldrovandi, and they occupy a prominent position in the history of zoology and comparative anatomy.”

Tags: History of Science, natural history, New Acquisition, ornithology

From an antiquarian dealer in Utrecht, we purchased an original watercolor of a parrot perched on a rock with a large butterfly, framed.  This image was intended for Manetti’s Ornithologia methodice(1767-76), which we hold in the Watkinson (shown here with the painting), but it was finally omitted, and never made it into the publication.

Saverio Manetti (1723-1785) produced one of the finest bird books in Italy in the 18th century, a forerunner to the great illustrated ornithological works of the 19thC (Audubon, Selby, etc.).  His plates were larger and more vibrantly colored than those of his predecessors, with an endeavor to show the birds in their natural habitats, rather than on sham branches and such.

Tags: New Acquisition

The following is a nice addition to our collection of conduct guides for youth (women and men), which we hope some day to be the subject of a full exhibition:

The Young Lady’s Pocket Library, or Parental Monitor (Edinburgh, 1793).  The Pocket Library collects three of the most popular conduct manuals for women in the eighteenth century: John Gregory’s Father’s Legacy (1774), Sarah Pennington’s Unfortunate Mother’s Advice(1761, when she was unfortunate in being separated from her husband and children by unexplained marital discord), and the Marchioness de Lambert’s Avis d’une Mere à sa Fille (1728, translated in 1729). Also present is Edward Moore’s verse Fables for the Female Sex (1744), which is in a different vein, written for amusement but still sometimes moralizing and cautionary.

Here is a quote from the Marchioness to her daughter:

“The world has in all ages been very negligent in the education of daughters . . . they design them to please; they give them no instructions but for the ornament and graces of the body; they flatter their self-love; they give them up to effeminacy, to the world, and to false opinions; they give them no lectures of virtue and fortitude: surely it is unreasonable or rather downright madness to imagine that such an education should not turn to their prejudice.”

Tags: New Acquisition

The Jubilee, an Interesting Game.  (London: John Harris, 1810).

This board game was designed as a jigsaw puzzle, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of reign of King George III. The game highlights the historical events that occurred during George III’s long reign, an important period for both Australia & the United States.  In the South Pacific, James Cook’s voyages yield important discoveries–vignettes include South Pacific natives, a Tahitian woman in a wide skirt, “Botany Bay” (aborigine & a kangaroo), and the Mutiny on the Bounty.  Events of the American Revolution are illustrated at length–“Stamps” being burned; the 1st meeting of Congress at NY; the battle at Lexington, MA; the Declaration of Independence; the Surrender of Burgoyne; the Surrender at Yorktown. Other events include the King’s marriage & birth of his children, riots in London & Birmingham, the Irish Rebellion, wars with Spain & France, and the subsequent peace.  Abolition of the slave trade; Haley’s Comet, Handel, hot air balloon & the smallpox vaccine, etc.  The game was published by John Harris, who took over Elizabeth Newberry’s publishing business in 1801 and worked until it was sold in 1843.  Newberry was part of the famous 18th century children’s literature publishers.  Harris also worked with John Wallis, one of the most prolific publishers of games and dissected puzzles between 1775 and 1847.

Here is a detail of the images.  At some point soon, we will reconstruct the counters and other pieces from the rules, and be able to PLAY this game of history in the Watkinson!

Tags: New Acquisition

The despatches of Hernando Cortés, the conqueror of Mexico, addressed to the emperor Charles V, written during the conquest, and containing a narrative of its events. New York: Wiley & Putnam, 1843.  This is the first translation into English from the original Spanish of the letters that Hernan Cortes wrote to the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (King Charles I of Spain) recounting various stages of the conquest of Mexico.  As a first-hand account, these letters are a valuable for what they reveal of the conquistador mentality.   The translator was George Folsom (1802–69), and the work contains the second, third, and fourth letters.

The Introduction is interesting because of its implied sanction of Christin imperialism:

“The conquest of Mexico by Hernando Cortes, at the head of a few hundred Spaniards, forms one of the most romantic episodes in history that give color to the saying, ‘truth is stranger than fiction’ . . . like all conquests in war, it was doubtless stained by acts of gross injustice and cruelty towards the conquered, for which no substantial justification can be alleged.  Some palliation may be sought, however, in the spirit of the age, which not only excused but commended the summary destruction of the enemies of the Christian faith wherever they might be found.”

Purchased from a book dealer in Philadelphia.

Tags: New Acquisition

James Mullalla,  A View of Irish Affairs since the Revolution of 1688 (Dublin, 1795).

The first edition of this treatise on Irish politics, to which Washington subscribed (for fifty copies) in the year he ratified the Jay Treaty, the accord which began a decade of peace with Britain.  Mullalla, ‘patriot’ historian, Trinity (Ireland) scholar and Freemason, analyzes the ‘calamities of the nation invariably flowing from public misrule, barbarous manners, private interest, and the rage of parties’.  He cites archives and authors studied at Oxford and Cambridge, and discusses the effects of political actions undertaken at the Vatican, at Westminster and on Irish soil.  Mullalla achieved notoriety in 1792 when he produced “the most politically provocative [pamphlet] of all.”  His Compilation on the Slave Trade, respectfully addressed to the Irish People, with its “blunt assertion of the African’s right to revolt against his master was a highly unusual feature in the anti-slavery discourse” (Rodgers).  A View of Irish Affairs sees Mullalla revisit the theme of Irish manumission, as he discusses the “narrow and illiberal policy of Great-Britain.”  Despite this, he is on the whole optimistic about the future relationship between the nations.  SEE Nini Rodgers, “Ireland and the Black Atlantic in the Eighteenth Century,” Irish Historical Studies, 32:126 (2000), pp. 174-192.

Tags: New Acquisition

Lisboa, José da Silva.  Principios de Direito Mercantil, e Leis de Marinha para uso da mocidade portugueza, destinada, ao commercio.  (Lisbon: Impressão Regia, 1801-1819). 

This work first appeared in 1798 (here expanded), proved highly influential, and was a pioneer of its kind published in Portuguese.  It covers such matters as insurance, commercial risk, averages, foreign exchange, contracts, the conduct of the ships’ company, and mercantile law.  The author was a native of Bahia and a distinguished political economist, who later became Visconde de Cairú.  He attributed many of the ills of Brazilian society to the reliance on negro slaves and later in 1818 ascribed the progress in São Paulo to the preponderance of the white race there (Maxwell, Conflicts and Conspiracies: Brazil and Portugal 1750-1808, 1973, pp. 227-8).  “In Portugal the harshest critic of the colonial system was José da Silva Lisboa . . . who guided the economic policy of Dom João VI in Brazil . . . Upholding liberal principles, he spread the ideas of Adam Smith in numerous works” (Emilia Viotti da Costa, “The Political Emancipation of Brazil,” IN From Colony to Nation: Esays on the Independence of Brazil, ed. by Russell Wood, 1975).

Tags: New Acquisition

Announcing the acquisition of a couple of nuggets, recently plucked from the trade:

Two manuscript journals by different authors, one recording a seaman’s nautical journey launched in 1881 from Saint John, New Brunswick, with stops at Saint Pierre, Long Harbor, and Halifax; and one a Brooklyn man’s 1885 trip to Florida by way of Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Georgia, mostly via train.

The sea journal describes the sailor’s never-ending efforts to keep the decks clean with sand and holystone and to keep himself clean as well; when no such labor is required, he reads “newspapers and history” or studies navigation and geometry, with a trip ashore noted for “target practice.”  There is one account of a fierce and damaging storm, and another of the attempted rescue of a steamer wrecked near Halifax; a Newfoundland 5-cent stamp with an image of a seal is pasted into the book.  At one point a lieutenant reads “the Articles of War”; it is possible, then, that this journal was kept on a Royal Navy vessel.

The Florida journal describes a visit to 1884 World’s Fair in New Orleans (the World Cotton Centennial Exposition) and includes a list of “Bird skins collected in Halifax River Region – 1885” as well as a lengthy itemization of travel expenses and another of birds seen or heard “during a walk 3 miles north of Jacksonville on afternoon of Feb. 7/85”

Tags: New Acquisition