We view through the lens of at least a hundred and twenty-five years ago the expanse of Manhattan, its surrounding waters, Brooklyn, and Governor's Island in the artful and scarce color lithograph NEW-YORK. This bird's eye view anchors our eye at the base of Manhattan and from there expands northward up the Hudson River to the horizon, up the East River past Brooklyn to Long Island Sound and southwest to Jersey City and Hoboken. These two New Jersey cities are named in the print's key in the lower margin as "Jersey City und Hoboken". While the publisher, printer and artist are not named, this combining of English and German in the key at the bottom of the print suggests a German publisher. There are two editions of this print. One edition on its face identifies the 19th c. Leipzig German publishers F.E. Wachsmuth and Adolf Lehmann who produced large educational art prints, among their other lines of work and no artist is named. 1/ That edition uses a thin linear typeface for the print's title NEW-YORK. Our print does not identify a publisher or artist and uses instead a framed typeface for the title with all other aesthetic aspects of this lithograph and dimensions being approximately the same. Our print's recent provenance is Germany.
The artistically complex NEW-YORK print shows a city on the move and at work. The artist 2/ has drawn the Hudson and East Rivers filled with steamers and multi-masted schooners and a windjammer.3/ Busy factory chimneys send up plumes of smoke. Steamers belch black smoke from their smoke stacks. This bird's eye view offers an axonometric view of landmark buildings in the foreground as well as the many apartment buildings and their varied rooftops. Broadway and other major avenues are dense with people. Church spires punch upwards above most of the buildings. Central Park is a sea of green, along with small parks and shade trees. Multiple layers of color and the lithographer's stone animate the busy waters of New York Harbor surrounding Governor's Island. Ships are docked at Jersey City's long wharf where open coal bins sit. No train tracks are shown on the wharf.
There is only one bridge in this scene and it crosses the East River from Manhattan to Brooklyn. The bridge is labeled in the lower margin of the print "East- River -Bridge" a project that began in 1869 and opened in 1883. At the tip of Manhattan, Castle Gardens - the New York immigration center up to 1892 is labeled on the print. 4/ It sits close to the Barge Office. A line of train cars approaches the ferry landing. Governor's Island is drawn showing Castle Williams, Fort Jay, and a few barracks buildings and chapel.
The print's historic scene is not literally reliable for dating the print as there are some anachronisms. In fact, NEW-YORK may belong to a sophisticated genre of more than school room art. The East River Bridge remained the only bridge crossing until 1903 when the Williamsburg Bridge opened. It is safe to say the print therefore was published 1902 or earlier. In 1892 Castle Gardens ceased its operation as New York's immigration center and was renamed in 1896 The New York Aquarium. [Ellis Island is not shown on this print.] Does that place the date for this print's publication before 1896? Also in 1896, The New York Times dropped the hyphen in "New York" influencing that printing convention. More notably however, the view of Governor's Island shows a 19th c. historical site plan prior even to 1879.5/
Therefore, the view in NEW-YORK might belong in the genre of futuristic views of New York from the mid-1870's, the artist and publisher anticipating completion of the East River Bridge and the growing prosperity of New York. A body of 1870's New York views, including Schlegel's 1873 print of New York 6/ show the anticipated East River Bridge and there are many other 1870's era examples.7/
The complex and instructional 19th c. NEW-YORK lithograph is scarce.
Notes:
1. The publisher F.E. Wachsmuth of Leipzig variously attributed to be active (1877-1910) and (1880-1929) and Adolf Lehmann of Leipzig (c. 1900-1928) specialized in a genre of chromolithographs - small and large scale -that represented geography, history, nature, science, fables etc. for schools in a format to be hung on the wall and called Charakterbilder and Schulbilder. Two viewed published examples of NEW-YORK bear "F.E. Wachsmuthverlag and Adolf Lehmann geogr." in the print's lower margin aligned with information in the key and undated. Dates attributed to this edition are c.1898-1900. No artist is named.
2. The NEW-YORK. print is not signed. German fine artist Mathieu Molitor (1873-1929) is documented as having moved to Liepzig in 1898 and employed c. 1899 by F.E. Wachsmuth for a period. Wachsmuth published school art and other genres, including commercial work. Birgit Hartung's Ph.D. dissertation about Mathieu Molitor, University of Leipzig, 1974, presents hundreds of photographs of Molitor's sophisticated sculpture, paintings, etchings and early advertising art work, but no art work of New York City or urban bird's eye views. Stylistically, NEW-YORK does not resemble any of the art shown in Hartung's work.
3. Please see the South Street Seaport article about ships and windjammers. About the 1885 Tall Ship Wavertree - South Street Seaport Museum
4. Castle Gardens ceased to be the immigration center year end 1891, replaced in 1892 by Ellis Island as the new immigration center. Castle Gardens was closed for several years, outfitted, reopened and renamed in 1896 as The New York Aquarium.
5. gsa-preservation-design-stds-3.pdf The National Park Service site plan of Governor's Island gives the completion date of each building in the historic district. Based on this site plan, the NEW-YORK. print portrays Governor's Island pre-1879 with very few buildings.
6. please see, New York, by printer G. Schlegel and John Bachman, artist published by Tamson & Dethlefs, New York c. 1874, LOC New York / print by G. Schlegel, 97 William St. N.Y. - raster image | Library of Congress.
7. See also Yale Museum's Charles Parsons, 1874, The Great East River Suspension Bridge, and other examples with curatorial notes. The Great East River Suspension Bridge: Connecting the Cities of New York and Brooklyn | Yale University Art Gallery