ORIGINAL c1863 'VIEW OF NEW BRITAIN, CONN - DRAWN FROM NATURE & LITH BY H KNECHT - PRINTED BY J RAU 38 PEARL ST NY' BIRDS EYE VIEW LITHOGRAPH
This is just a great original piece. If you have followed my store for years, you know I try and buy and sell more and more of these wonderful mid 19th Century Birds Eye views of small towns around America. Many of them are incredibly rare and there are only a couple of known examples of each. I love the opportunity for a collector to own one of these pieces of history of their own town. This is one of the finer ones I have come across. And also the rarest. I have only been able to find one other example of this scarce original. In doing my research I did find a wonderful article from an exhibit at the Connecticut Historical Society that this print was exhibited. I have included that information below. This is a wonderful example of this print with the visible image measuring 18 x 25 inches. A very good clean example. Original color is strong and clean. There are a few repairs you can see within the image including a few flattened wrinkles. The upper left corner, outside the image, shows a small repaired tear. You can see the page shows some rippling which leads me to believe it is not laid down. Original matte shows some minor matte burn. I have not examined the print out of the frame as it is just an excellent presentation of this scarce print. Materials are definitely not archival and should probably be replaced to preserve the print. Frame measures 27 3/4 x 34 1/4 inches.
In doing my research, I found a wonderful description of this print from the Connecticut Historical Society that reads: "In this bird’s-eye view of New Britain, Walnut Hill Park and Reservoir dominates the foreground. As such, the print can be seen as a celebration of this recent addition to the city. In 1856, a few years prior to the lithograph’s production, a group of 10 men purchased the hill for the purpose of constructing a reservoir and park for the community. The hill had been a pasture land, which accounts for its barren appearance in the print. (In 1870, New Britain would contract Olmsted, Vaux & Company to develop a master design plan for the park, and lush plantings, walkways, drinking fountains, and other amenities would be added overtime.) The conversion of this land was part of a growing public parks movement in the late 1800s that was inaugurated with the creation of Bushnell Park in Hartford and Central Park in New York City.
Numerous factories and businesses had developed in the center of New Britain along Main Street, and the park offered citizens a peaceful respite from crowds and noise. As urban theorists abandoned the idea that manufacturing could exist in harmony with the countryside, the parks movement developed to bring a piece of the country into the city.
This scene invited those beholding it to identify with the well-dressed citizens shown admiring the new park, above and away from the busy city center below. The 10 vignettes accompanying the central image of the park also diminish the industrial and commercial atmosphere of New Britain by illustrating private residences, churches, and the New Britain Normal School (the predecessor of Central Connecticut State University).
Kate Steinway, Executive Director of the Connecticut Historical Society (CHS) in Hartford, curated the traveling exhibition, Hamlets & Hubs; Bird’s-Eye Views of Connecticut Towns, 1849-1908 (1987-88), from which this article is derived, while Curator of Prints and Photographs at CHS."