An Englishman's Journey to the American West. With Yosemite, Western, and Hawaii Ephemera.
With a Rare Yosemite Pamphlet - Not in Kruska!
An unusually extensive and impressive 19th-century travel account of the United States, detailing the Englishman O. D. Parker's grand tour of the North American continent. This report of life out West in the post-Civil War period is filled with descriptive manuscript text and dozens of ephemeral fliers, maps, albumen prints, newspaper clippings, and much more.
The volumes span two separate American voyages. The first, in 1881, sees Parker visit the East Coast and Canada, with an accounting of his time in New York, Boston, Ottawa, and Montreal. The second volume documents his 1882 travels further west as he ventured along the Union Pacific to reach California. Once there, his voyage throughout California, to Napa Valley, San Francisco, and other regions is well documented (although he elected not to go to Yosemite, despite the ephemera that he collected). From California, Parker then traveled across the Pacific to Hawaii and New Zealand, and he provides an account of Honolulu.
The ephemera included in the volumes is delightfully diverse. Parker makes use of a variety of railroad maps, including a Chicago Great Rock Island Route map which he dissects to illustrate the states that he travels through on his journey. The diversity of other ephemera collected is impressive - a colonial dollar print in Boston, a printed circular advertising "Yosemite Now Open," and a circular for the Easter Service at Trinity Church in Boston.
Parker further complements his notebook with a plethora of finely executed sketches. These include sketches of Harper's Ferry dated 1881 and other points of interest along his railroad journey. Perhaps most interesting (from a cartographic standpoint) is his sketch map of North America overlaying the sizes of various European countries onto the continent.
While most of the ephemera is contemporary, it is clear that Parker added in a few loose sheets in later years. The occasional postcard or newspaper clipping bears a later date, sometimes added in pencil. Parker obviously had fond memories of this trip and frequently thought of the journey in his later years.
Yosemite Pamphlet
Volume II of the travel journal includes a twenty-page pamphlet printed by Crocker & Co's Print, in San Francisco, entitled California Tourist. Hand Book for Yosemite, the Big-Tree Groves, Geysers, Monterey and other popular summer Resorts of California. This is issue No 2 of 1882.
This pamphlet includes two maps showing the route to Yosemite from San Francisco and the route to the California geysers. Fares and the timetables for these voyages are further described.
Currey & Kruska 1992, Bibliography of Yosemite, the Central and the Southern High Sierra, and the Big Trees 1839 - 1900, lists only item 332 which describes "No 3. 1881. California Tourist."
Contents
Volume I
Ephemera from Volume I focuses on the East Coast and the St. Lawrence River region, and includes some rare railroad and canal ephemera (including an apparently very rare map of the Delaware and Hudson Canal and Railroad Company Saratoga Line). Several albumen photographs are included. Engraved pamphlets for hotels abound. Highlights include:
- Ephemera relating to the Cunard Line and the R.M.S. Scythia, including a ship's manifest
- Engraved trade card for the "Fancy Job Printers"
- Four menus, one engraved for the Windsor Hotel, New York; another for the Lindsell Hotel, Saint Louis; another for the Michigan Central Railroad dining car
- Dozens of reproduced commercial photos, some folding, of New York, Washington D.C., Chicago, and other cities
- Railroad schedules, including Boston to Richmond along the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad; Ohio and Mississippi Railroad,
- Pencil sketch of Harper's Ferry and John Brown's Fort dated 1881.
- Albumen photograph of the Capitol (slightly tattered)
- Railroad map from the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, trimmed to only include the Western States, west of Texas. Additional incomplete folding railroad maps with timetables on verso.
- Sketch map comparing the sizes of European countries to the United States with additional manuscript text
- Engraved pamphlet for "The Prospect House, Niagara Falls"
- Albumen photo of Boston, from the State House
- A 1783 State of Massachussetts Dollar, with a cancellation hole
- One watercolor sketch of a valley scene
- Rare, complete pamphlet for the Delaware and Hudson Canal and Railroad Company Saratoga Line (we have been unable to locate additional examples )
- Albumen photograph of Montreal
- Steamship timetable for the St. Lawrence Steam Navigation Co
- Sketch reproduction of what various journey vouchers looked like
Volume II
Ephemera from Volume II expands the focus of the notebooks further west. The most notable ephemera from this section are the extremely rare Yosemite flier and pamphlet. Other highlights include:
- Ephemera relating to the Cunard Line and the S.S. Atlas
- Newspaper clippings
- Numerous reproduced photos, some folding, of Montreal, Cincinatti, and other cities, as well as natural sites along the Union Pacific track
- Ephemera for Easter Morning, 1882, chapel service for Trinity Church, Boston, including an engraved eight-page choral service
- Incomplete railroad maps, including one clipped to illustrate individual states adjoining text describing Parker's journey to that state
- Flyer printed on a pink sheet, somewhat taterred, reading "Yosemite Now Open."
- Twenty-page "California Tourist. Hand Book for Yosemite, the Big-Tree Groves, Geysers, Monterey, and other popular summer Resorts of California." Not in Kruska
- Newspaper clippings related to the Chinese Exclusion act
- Time table of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company
- Engraved map of the Routes of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company
- Albumen photograph of a harbor, apparently Honulu as suggested by its emplacement in the diary
- Sketch reproduction of a concert program aboard the Pacific Mail Steamship