Exhibit: Audubon’s Birds of America

Main Library
Lobby Display Case & Second Floor Display Case

John James Audubon is most well-known for his double elephant folio editions of The Birds of America, the four-volume set published between 1827 and 1838 on paper sized approximately 26 1/4 x 39 1/2 inches, the largest sheets available at the time.[1] 

Audubon produced a smaller and more affordable seven volume edition with the lithographer J. T. Bowen in 1844.[2]  After Audubon died in 1851, his family authorized several more editions in the smaller format, known as the royal octavo, including George Lockwood’s version that is on display.[3]

Lockwood printed eight volumes instead of seven and used as many as he could of the original stereotype and stone plates made for the 1840 and 1850 editions.  The Lockwood edition is the last octavo edition printed from the original stones as they were destroyed sometime after 1870 in a warehouse fire in Philadelphia. [4]

The Lockwood edition of The Birds of America is part of the Rare Book Collection of the Library’s Archives and Special Collections.

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[1] From Friends of the Audubon:  https://friendsofaudubon.org/2020/07/the-double-elephant-folio-where-did-it-come-from/

[2] From Wikipedia:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Birds_of_America

[3] From Christie’s Auction: https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-5963347 Cites Ayer/Zimmer pp.25-26; Nissen IVB 52; Wood p. 209.

[4] From Christie’s Auction: https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-5963347 Cites Ayer/Zimmer pp.25-26; Nissen IVB 52; Wood p. 209.

The Rise of the 19th Century Naturalist

Mary Vaux Walcott’s Pale Ladyslipper or Cypripedium acaule from North American Wildflowers, Volume I,  published by The Smithsonian Institution, 1925.

Exhibition Location: Entrance and 2nd Floor, Glass Building

These rare naturalist tomes from the Cambridge Room Collection are on display in honor of the Secret Gardens of Cambridge Tour, happening on June 1st. These multivolume series are the great works of the American naturalists of the mid 19th and early 20th Centuries.

During this time, the United States was an irresistible blank slate for naturalists to catalog and describe every plant and wildflower springing to life and for artists to draw in fantastic detail every reptile and four legged creature roaming the land.

This small collection contains some of the finest examples of 19th Century American naturalism: from the indisputable John James Audubon, author of the famed The Birds of America, to fearless Mary Vaux Walcott, one of the only women naturalists in an all male club, who wrote North American Wildflowers.