National Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Americans
Homer
National Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Americans Conducted by James B.
Longacre, Philadelphia; and James Herring, New York. Under the
Superintendence of the American Acamemy of the Fine Arts.
The National Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Americans. Philadelphia, New
York, 1839. Volume IV 5.5" x 5". Illustrated with 39 engraved portraits.
Conducted by James B. Longacre, Philadelphia; and James Herring, New York.
Under the Superintendence of the American Acamemy of the Fine Arts.
Philadelphia, New York: Engraved title. Occasional foxing, browning. The
authors were James Barton Longacre and James Herring, both of the American
Academy of the Fine Arts, and organization primarily of collectors which
preceded the National Academy of Design. Although each subject has a short
biography appended, the book was really marketed for the wonderful etched
portraits of historically important Americans taken from life by a series of
American artists.The set was the first serious attempt to reproduce
portraits of all the great men in the glorious years of the revolution and
its extension, the War of 1812. It stands as a landmark of early American
biography and illustration. First issued in parts, the copy at hand is the
first state of the second issue, with each part or article paginated
separately.
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