“For centuries, artists had stored their paints in pigs’ bladders. It was a painstaking process: they, or their apprentices, would carefully cut the thin skin into squares. Then they would spoon a nugget of wet paint onto each square, and tie up the little parcels at the top with string. When they wanted to paint, they would pierce the skin with a tack, squeeze the color onto their palette and then mend the puncture. It was messy, especially when the bladders burst, but it was also wasteful, as the paint would dry out quickly. Then in 1841 a fashionable American portrait painter called John Goffe Rand devised the first collapsible tube — which he made of tin and sealed with pliers. After he had improved it the following year and patented it, artists in both Europe and America really began to appreciate the wonder of the portable paintbox.”
from Color: A Natural History of the Palette by Victoria Finlay
Painting is
Claude Monet Painting by the Edge of a Wood
by John Singer Sargent
1885
“An experiment in communal living so unusual that it is sometimes called unique, took place near Las Cruces, New Mexico, over a hundred years ago, and yet it has remained almost unknown among area residents until the last few years. Shalam Colony was a utopian community for children established six miles northwest of Las Cruces in the fall of 1884 by John B. Newbrough and a group of his religious followers from New York who called themselves Faithists.”
…
“Katherine Stoes, a Las Cruces history enthusiast and a friend of Frances Newbrough Howland, has described the Newbrough’s home in New Orleans as containing a baby crib near which was a sign that read, ‘Children Wanted and No Questions Asked.’”
John B. Newbrough wrote “a new Bible, called Oahspe, while under spirit control.”
“Plate 18.—THE EARTH IN OCGOKUK.
Jehovih said: Out of the etherean mountains of Ocgokuk I brought the earth, prepared for My four Sons: Abram, Brahma, Po and Eawahtah. And I numbered the earth at one hundred, for it had attained to fullness.”
from OAHSPE
1882
“Plate 2.—ETHEREANS VISITING THE EARTH.
A, Atmospherea; B, Ethereans; E, Earth; C, Distance: 20,000 miles.”
from OAHSPE
1882
“Plate 1.—EARTH, LOWER HEAVEN, AND ETHEREAN HOSTS DESCENDING.”
from OAHSPE
1882
“PLATE 50.—PLANETS.
B, B, B, B, B, planets.
Fig. 1, photosphere, or light on every side;
Fig. 2, negative currents;
Fig. 3, relative enlargement of a planet on the illuminate side;
Fig. 4, enlargement illustrative of age of planet;
Figs. 5 and 8, variation in vortex, called variation of needles;
1, 1, etherea, or inactive space;
2, 2, 2, 2, place of actinic force.
The Panic signs denote the expression in numbers.”
from OAHSPE
1882
“Memories of the Past”
c1880
Stereo copyrighted by Melander & Bro.
“White cat ; Welsh ; Witch ; White Lady”
Illustrations numbered (61-64)
from Fancy dress described : or, what to wear at fancy balls.
by Ardern Holt
1880
Last minute costume ideas.
“The Haunted Lane”
c1889
Stereo copyrighted by Melander
“In an era of deliberately esoteric dining clubs, the Ichthyophagous Club seemed positively practical-minded. Members of the Thirteen Club, who made it their mission to combat superstitious behavior, were known to descend on Mott Street and order Chinese delicacies in multiples of the unlucky number, while each guest at the Locust Grove Swimmers’ annual repast was required to polish off a whole duck and an entire lemon pie before leaving the table. (A wooden paddle was suspended above that same table, for the vigorous punishment of any attendee who told the same story twice.) The Five-Pounder Club asked even more of its members, confining each man to the dining room until he weighed five pounds more than he had at the start of the evening; collective obesity eventually forced the club’s disbandment.”
