Show ana an adventure advent ure in m american america history astory L at t at ro ap g A f q A 4 ap 75 J t ali AH pictures from TU th of america yale university press pro by ELMO SCOTT WATSON 0 HOST americans mention of 0 a the tha event which we celebrate on r july 4 the signing of the dec w I 1 la lar atlon ration of independence brings r to mind the famous painting of 0 that historic scene which hangs in the rotunda or of the capitol in washington for it Is through the eyes ot of john trumbull the connecticut painter that we have received most or of our visual impressions not only of 0 what took place in independence hall ball in philadelphia on july 4 0 1776 but of many of the other great events to in the american revolution A short time ago yale university commemorated the centenary of the opening of the oldest art gallery in a this country connected with a college the founder of that art gallery the architect of the original building was this same sam john trumbull whose body lies in a vault beneath the fine arts building which has succeeded the simple little structure which he designed and which housed the original collection of his canvasses that have since become so famous the commemorative ceremonies which consisted principally of showing again all of the trumbull collection of paintings as they had once been displayed in the vanished building which he designed not only served to honor the painter of americas epic but it emphasized once more the part which tills this university has played in the visual education of americans in the history of their country it recalled once more an ambitious project of that institution in this educational field beld begun more than a decade ago and appropriately enough brought to a triumphant conclusion during the year in which the centennial of Atner american lean independence was being cel celebrated brat that was the publication of the pageant of america a 13 15 volume pictorial history of our country which has worked something of a revolution in the methods of presenting and studying american history I 1 the idea for or such a project took form while the yale tale university press which had bad just completed publication of another notable historical series the chronicles of america was experimenting peri with the presentation of the drama of american history through the medium of moving pictures the result of this experiment was the outlining of a plan for a pictorial chronicle of america in book form there have been many pictorial lar hIs histories of america but the majority of them have been comparatively valueless because the pictures have often been an excuse to weaken the text and the text has been an excuse to pass off hacku hackneyed eyed or deceptive pictures on the confiding reader so the problem of the yale authorities ties was not only to avoid a repetition of the errors which had given pictorial history A bad repute but also to prepare a combination of pictures and text which would be scholarly enough to satisfy the most exacting scientific historian and lively and interesting enough to meet the demands of popular appeal without sacrificing anything of accuracy and authenticity but the most interesting story of all in connection wl with th the presentation of this unique pa pageant Is the story of the worldwide world wide search tor for tho thai pictures which went into it it Is the story of an adventure in american history as romantic an adventure in many of its aspects as any incident which Is recorded in our school his tortes lories for it Is the story of a nine year search through private collections and these thase of governmental ern mental bodies historical societies libraries museums museum urt t pill erles learned societies and A 1 1 french uniforms worn during the french and indian war 1754 1763 from the paintings painting by H A ogden 2 the earliest engraved likeness of columbus published in 1575 from the hovius portrait the original source of all columbus portraits 3 emigrants attacked by indians on the western plains A typical incident of the opening of the trans mississippi country after the drawing by F 0 C darley the foremost illustrator of american life and history in that period 4 the first oil well A derrick was erected in the neighborhood of titusville Titus ville pa and in the year 1859 the boring for oil began in the photograph drake wearing a s silk 11 k hat appears talking to his friend peter wilson a druggist of titusville Titus ville from a contemporary photograph taken by john A mather institutes and religious and educational institutions not only in tills this country but in foreign countries ns as well it Is the story of some fine detective work in following clews some of which ended successfully and some unsuccessfully of persistence and perseverance in ID tile the ance of baffling problems and seemingly insuperable obstacles all in the name of historical accuracy I 1 but out of it all came a total of more than authenticated pictures as the basis tor for what Is now recognized as the first and thus far the only real source book of pictorial americana incidentally when tile the work was completed it represented the expenditure for capital account of more than probably the largest sum e ever eer er spent for a single piece of historical research but a very modest amount when compared to th ill value and importance of the results obtained in considering the task before the yale authorities ties it must be remembered that american history began long long ong before there were cameras to record historic incidents as they are recorded today so the only pictorial record we have of some events of the greatest historical importance was made by artists equipped only with the crudest sort of instruments and materials for their work but the importance of their accomplishment lies in the fact that they furnished contemporary records and the modern camera can be used for copying their heir work and here again comes in the matter of cost in producing the pageant of america for in many cases the cost of securing a copy of some individual picture ranged anywhere from up to in two of the volumes of the series are 17 full page illustrations such as Is shown above which reproduce in colors the uniforms worn by participants in the various american wars the search for authentic paintings types lithographs and engravings of contemporary events and for charters commissions and other documents preserved in official archives took the research staff of the pageant ila bant of america into many strange places lia it was as recognized at the start that the discovery of america was only an incident in the discovery of asia and that to illustrate the background of the beginnings of american history it would be necessary to find pictures which would show the influences lo in europe as tar far back as the time of and marco polo which led ultimately ti lately to columbus attempt to find the route to asia by sailing west so the earliest dated picture in the pageant Is a page from the latin manuscript of adam of bremen in the eleventh century in which litch the first mention of vinland discovered by the norsemen norseman Nor semen wa was 9 made after cons considerable tile difficulty this tu manuscript artuse fript was located in the staats in vienna of portraits ot of columbus popularly reg regarded added as the discoverer ut of america there are legion but it remained for the yale research staff to trace back for the first time all these portraits to their original source and that original source Is the hovius portrait shown above an engraving which it Is believed was first pub fished in 1575 and which is a copy of a portrait that hung in the famous gallery of paulus corlus archbishop of nocera kocara a man of vast wealth who spent a fortune in collecting portraits of the great men of his time and who was an ardent admirer of the italian navigator it Is believed that this Is the only portrait of 0 columbus painted during his lift time buck back of a portrait which appears in another volume of the pageant the winning of freedom Is a typical story of perseverance when this volume was in preparation the authors wanted a portrait of one of the german officers who fought under tile british flag during the revolution none being available in this country a search awas was begun through the amer tean ican consul general in berlin after considerable correspondence with various museums and P private private collectors the consul general learned that an excellent oil painting of baron friederich edesel Iti who commanded the hessians under burgoyne was still hanging in the castle of neuenhof hof bet bel eisenach hessen through the courtesy of freiherr albrecht Me Ki edesel desel a descendant ant of the eighteenth century baron permission was finally granted a year later to make a photographic copy of the original even more devious was the trail which finally led to an all authentic daguerreotype of wllliam william liam F harnden founder of the express business in the united states while assembling material for the volume the march of commerce the editors came upon a very poor woodcut of Ilar riden in history ni story of the express companies published in 1838 1853 desiring the original daguerreotype from which this reproduction had apparently been made they enlisted the aid of the officials of the american rallay hallway express company through S 31 baker general auditor at chattanooga tenn they learned that the original had been in the possession of son who was living in san francisco shortly after using the san francisco directories they addressed identical letters to several listed therein one of these was IV K barnden and he proved to be a grandson of william F barnden W K replied that he believed the desired daguerreotype was in the possession of ids his elder brother frederic I 1 then hen living in palo alto such proved to be the case but the end of tle trail was not yet for the lie elder brother brot lier could nut not locate the picture as it had been in storage for some time finally however a year after the first inquiry a copy of the daguerreotype ua received just in time to be reproduced and included in the pictorial history of the express b ess hut but not all descendants of past notables were as helpful as the Harn dens the yale authorities tell the story of the search for an authentic portrait of a little known but important ng figure in the revolution they located one of his descendants in a small new england town a woman who owned a contemporary oil portrait of the revolutionary evolutionary It lighter fighter put but when appealed to for permission to reproduce the painting she refused presumably because of the reticence and reserve which characterize the ol 01 old d fashioned spinster lady of the yankee type find and also possibly because she feared that some injury to the painting might result so it was as necessary to send a member of the editorial staff there for the purpose of coaxing the old lady to make it possible for her ancestor tobe to be represented in this important historical work the staff member found the portrait hanging in the parlor where it could not be photographed on the wall and he experienced great difficulty in persuading her to let him take it down from the wall then when he secured the necessary permission she would not let him take the painting out of the house so he had to bring a commercial photographer tor for more than one hundred miles in order to make certain of getting a good copy a 0 by western newspaper volon union |