Skip to content

Cart

Your cart is empty

Article: Sharing America with the Masses

Sharing America with the Masses

Early America was a land of vast, breathtaking wilderness. American art of the late 18th to early 19th centuries shifted from genre and religious paintings to landscape paintings, as artists took inspiration from the unspoiled nature surrounding them. These large landscape paintings, specifically brought about by the Hudson River School in the 19th century, served as both a romanticized view of the new nation as well as encouragement to expand westward. These large paintings were transported across the country for shows, displaying the breathtaking scenes of the country to a wide audience.

As new territories were added to the Union in the early 19th century, such artistic depictions gave the American population a look at what was yet to be claimed in the west. The wood and steel engravings shown in works such as Picturesque America, or The Land We Lived In, had a profound influence on the growth of tourism and the historic preservation movement in the United States.

The images of Picturesque America depict diverse scenes captured from travels across the country, from the New York Catskills to pre-bridge Golden Gate Harbor. They were engraved after original art by famous 19th century painters such as Thomas Moran, R. Swain Gifford, and Harry Fenn. Picturesque America allowed many Americans to see, for the first time, what they had only abstractly imagined as their country. With detailed prints and intriguing articles, Picturesque America exposed readers to parts of America that were just being explored, as well as more familiar scenes of established cities. It also presented a unified, expanding, and prosperous country, moving on after the strife of the Civil War.

Picturesque Washington accomplished a similar goal, just on a smaller scale. The work’s many essays, together with its numerous wood engravings and maps, offer a historical snapshot of the nation’s capital in the 1880s after a period of immense population and architectural growth. It served as both travelogue and travel guide to visitors to Washington and locals looking to explore more of their city.

19th century maps also showed the expanding American landscape, oftentimes including engaging and enticing imagery that encouraged Manifest Destiny. This hand-colored map depicts the recent acquisition of Upper California, New Mexico, and Texas at the conclusion of the Mexican-American War, with the newly acquired land colored in stark contrast to the rest of the country.

Read more

Adolphe Hippolyte Dufour's 1864 Map of America - The Great Republic

Adolphe Hippolyte Dufour's 1864 Map of America

Original maps have become more scarce and hard to come by, and those that have survived are collectible for many different reasons. One example of a highly collectible original map is this beautifu...

Read more
Norman Rockwell - The Great Republic

Norman Rockwell

Norman Rockwell is one of the most famous American artists and illustrators to date. Read more about this influential artist in this week's blog.

Read more

Blog posts

Patriotic and Starry: A Spectacular Centennial Flag - The Great Republic
Flags

Patriotic and Starry: A Spectacular Centennial Flag

This “1776/1876” Centennial Celebration flag is one of the more spectacular and celebratory designs to come from the nation's Centennial celebration. Flags with stars that spell out numeric or alph...

Read more
New In: A Theodore Roosevelt Signed Letter on Nonpartisan Governance from 1913 - The Great Republic
Autographs

New In: A Theodore Roosevelt Signed Letter on Nonpartisan Governance from 1913

This fantastic signed letter from Theodore Roosevelt emphasizes his stance on capable leadership over partisan loyalty. Dated July 2, 1913 and written to Roscoe Mitchell, a prominent journalist and...

Read more
Colorado in the 1890's - The Great Republic
photography

Colorado in the 1890's

The cabinet card is a style of photograph first introduced in 1863 by Windsor & Bridge in London. Consisting of a photographic print mounted on stiff card stock, the cabinet card got its name f...

Read more
Back to the top