Weaver Family Letters, including letters to and from Philadelphia Lithographer Matthias S. Weaver, from his family in Springfield, Summit County, Ohio, 1837-1853

Descripción:

18 letters, 52 pages, mainly quarto, inscribed in ink, in good, clean, and legible condition. Group of letters of the Weaver family, both incoming and outgoing correspondence of Matthew S. Weaver, a Philadelphia lithographer and his family and fiancé, Eliza Burgert, in Ohio. Weaver attended the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia and then went to work as a commercial lithographer to make ends meet. He made frequent trips back to Ohio to visit family and his fiancé Eliza Burgert. The Weaver family owned a farm in Springfield, Summit County, Ohio, and during the late 1830s and early 1840?s joined the fad that swept across America of silk culture. Weaver writes to his family about his activities in Philadelphia, various drawing projects he was engaged in, national politics and more. Weaver and his father traded natural history specimens with a Mr. Phillips of Philadelphia?s Academy of Natural Sciences. Weaver became ill with tuberculosis in the mid-1840s and left Philadelphia for Ohio, and spent time in Mackinaw, Michigan, apparently for his health. Here he supported himself by painting portraits of local merchants to support himself, he died in 1847. ?Matthias Shirk Weaver (1816-1847) born on November 25, 1816, probably in New Holland, Pennsylvania, studied and worked as an artist and lithographer in Philadelphia 1838-1845. He made yearly trips back to visit family in Ohio and on September 15, 1842, during an Ohio visit married Eliza Burgert. Together they had one son, Henry Matthias, who lived to adulthood. Matthias Weaver died of consumption in Summit County, Ohio on October 20, 1847. Weaver came to Philadelphia to study art at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1838. To support himself, he worked as a lithographic artist, predominantly with printer Thomas Sinclair, drawing large Philadelphia business advertisements, membership certificates, book illustrations, sheet music covers, and maps. Some of Weaver?s most noted work comprised plates for texts authored by Philadelphia?s scientific and medical community, including Dr. Samuel George Morton?s Crania Americana (1839) and Crania Aegyptica (1844). Weaver had an active social life while living in Philadelphia, playing in a musical society, joining the William Wirt Library and Literary Institute, and attending lectures and theater performances. Weaver recorded thoughts about his work and his personal life, including socializing with Philadelphia lithographer William Rease, in diaries he kept between 1840 and 1843, now in possession of the Ohio Historical Society. In failing health and frustrated with lithography as a profession, Weaver, along with his young family, returned to Ohio in 1845. He died a month before his thirty-first birthday on October 20, 1847.? Sample Quotes: ?Philada Nov. 23rd 1840 (Incomplete letter from Matthias S. Weaver) My Dear Father, Yours of Nov 2nd was recd on the 16th I was really glad to hear from Home once more; I began to think I was forgotten? Well the Elections are over ? and Harrison will be our next President ? never since the days of Washington has there been such an overwhelming majority on the one side, and such an utter defeat on the other - I do not know that History can point to the parallel of such a rebuke as Van Buren has received ? a whole nation rising up in judgment against an unworthy Ruler. Oh! I thank Heaven for having been born in a land, where the will of the people is supreme ? and that supremacy can be asserted through the quiet ? yet withering ballot box! However flattering to Genl Harrison this great popularity may be ? still his situation is not an enviable one ? the whole Country now looks to his measures for relief ? and wise indeed will be that course which shall give satisfaction to all the sections of our great country -- ? I was at the Exhibition of the Franklin Institute ? and saw a great quantity of ruled silk there ? but amo. N° de ref. del artículo 030870

Denunciar este artículo

Detalles bibliográficos

Título: Weaver Family Letters, including letters to ...
Encuadernación: No Binding
Condición: Very Good