Rare Suite of California Wood Engravings
A panorama of California history from prehistoric times through the beginning of air travel, through a series of fine wood engravings by a noted California artist. The images evoke the romance of California history through a visual chronicle of major events from the time of the La Brea Tar Pits to the advent of air travel. Each engraving is titled and signed (in pencil) by Goodchild.
This is Goodchild's first book. Published under the obscure private press imprint of Bark N' Rags. Goodchild was born in San Luis Obispo in 1901. By 1932 he was living in Southern California, having settled in Glendale. He died in 1983.
Victoria Dailey has written on California books illustrated with original woodblocks, though she seems to have overlooked Goodchild's California Milestones:
The woodcut became the preferred medium of most California graphic artists, as it united several theoretical and stylistic currents of the time. - Dailey, The Illustrated Book in California 1905-1940, The Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Arts, Winter, 1988, Vol. 7 (Winter, 1988), pages 72-87.
Paul Landacre was the giant in the field of Califorina wood engravers, though the first few decades of the 20th-century saw a fair number of other talents, which Dailey covers in her excellent article. Goodchild's work is somewhat evocative of that of Prescott Chaplin, who also illustrated several books with black-and-white woodcuts, including: 25 Woodcuts and Mexicans (both from 1930).
A selection of the wood engravings:
- La Brea Pits
- Came the Ice Age [wild horses]
- Dark Age Pictograph
- The Aborigines [coast scene of California Native Americans]
- Arrival of Hwui Shan 500 A.D.
- Landing of Cabrillo in California 1542
- Capture of a Galleon
- Junipero Serra.
- San Diego de Alcala
- Mission San Carlos Boromeo 1770
- Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa 1772
- Anza Crossing the Desert 1774
- Mission Santa Barbara 1786
- Mission San Francisco de Solano 1823
- Hides and Tallow
- A Barbecue
- Original Bear Flag 1846
- Doña Eduarda
- Pueblo de Los Angles
- Custom House, Monterey
- Fremont and Foren at San Marcos Pass
- Prospectors
- Across the Plains
- Around the Horn
- In through the Golden Gate
- City Hotel, San Francisco 1846
- First School House, San Francisco 1847
- Telegraph Hill, San Francisco 1850
- Ferry Building, San Francisco 1869
- First Overland Mail
- A Stage Station
- Road agents [stage coach robbery]
- The Fruit of Evil [lynch mob hanging]
- A Mountain Homestead
- Line Feud
- A Symbol of Our Time [small airplane in flight]
With a foreword by Rockwell D. Hunt, California historian, longtime dean at the University of Southern California, proclaimed "Mr. California" by Governor Goodwin Knight.
Cecil Wray Goodchild (1901-1983), born in San Luis Obispo, California, was a self-taught painter and printmaker who specialized in watercolor and wood engraving. After moving to southern California in 1932 and settling in Glendale, he featured his work at the Biltmore Salon. His works are part of collections at the Los Angeles Public Library, Mills College, and the Library of Congress.
Rarity
This book was issued in a limited edition of only 100 and many of these have undoubtedly been broken with the plates dispersed. Only a single example noted in RBH in the last fifty years. Seven copies located in WoldCat (UC San Diego, UCLA, Cal State Fullerton, Sacramento Public, Los Angeles Public, A.K. Smiley Library, Californa State Library).