Barlow Thomas Oldham (3 results)

Auburn Lodge, 38A Victoria Road, Kensington, Saturday 11 July [1885]. Thomas Oldham Barlow (1824-1889), mezzotint engraver. "Mr Irving called yesterday. I have settled with him about the Engraving. He takes the plate for 200 Gs. I send herewith the only proof & this is not quite finished. I purpose working upon it Monday & Tuesday . What a nice fellow Irving is!".

Hardcover. Condition: Good. First Edition. Hardback. No Dust Jacket. 4to. pp xvi, 120. Rebound in quarter black leather over red cloth (possibly early 20th century), lettered gilt at the spine. Some scuffing and rubbing at spine, otherwise close very good. Name label on the front pastedown of Rev. G.H. Davenport. Signedes.

Condition: Good. Steel line and stipple engraving. 24 x 33.5 inches. Marginal tears and abrasions., partially mounted on linen.left to right: Henry T. Tuckerman (1813-1871), Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-1894), William Gilmore Simms (1806-1870), Fitz-Greene Halleck (1790-1867), Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864), Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882), Nathaniel Parker Willis (1806-1867), William H. Prescott (1796-1859), Washington Irving (1783-1859), James Kirke Paulding (1778-1860), Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882), William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878), John Pendleton Kennedy (1795-1870), James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851), and George Bancroft (1800-1891).This imaginary scene shows fifteen celebrated literary figures gathered at the home of Washington Irving, author of such popular tales as "Rip Van Winkle" (1819) and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" (1820). Advertisements published in the New York Times in December 1863 announced the painting's exhibition at a Manhattan art gallery, where visitors could purchase a fifty-four-page booklet describing the work. "It is, in the truest and completest sense, a National picture," the anonymous author declared, and its production "will be universally regarded as a National event."The painting resulted from a collaborative effort. The photographer Mathew Brady captured the likeness of each writer (including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Irving himself), and the artist F. O. C. Darley designed the group composition. Working from those materials, Christian Schussele painted this canvas while Thomas Oldham Barlow engraved a widely reproduced print.From the collection of Frederic Gale Ruffner, Jr., the founder of Gale Research, Detroit.