[Limited to 18 Copies | Portfolio of 12 Etchings] In Old New York

Hollyer, Samuel. In Old New York. New York: Geo. D. Smith, 1900-1902. A complete portfolio of 12 etchings, signed the artist Samuel Hollyer (1826-1919) on each etching, and signed by the publisher Geo. D. Smith on the front of each folder housing the prints. The etchings were printed in a limited edition of 103 impressions, with 85 on India paper and 18 on Japan paper; this is copy #2 of the Japan paper edition. Each of the prints has been delicately hand-colored.

Print paper size: 14" x 11"; image size: approx. 6.5" x 4.5". Each print is housed in its own titled folder (many still with their original tissues), though most folders are worn/chipped, and split at the hinge. Some light browning to edges of the prints, specific issues noted below.

• No. 1 (1900): Bowling Green in Colonial Times (crease to left edge)
• No. 2 (1901): The Old Beekman House (small crease to corner, Hollyer's signature slightly smudged)
• No. 3 (1901): Federal Hall
• No. 4 (1901): The Old Stone Bridge Tavern and Garden at Broadway and Canal Street (small crease to corner)
• No. 5 (1901): The Hall of the Tammany Society, or Columbian Order, Erected In 1812, At Park Place And Frank-Fort Street
• No. 6 (1901): The Old City Hall in Wall Street / 1776 (some pencil notes to folder, slight crease to right edge)
• No. 7 (1901): The Old "Florence Road House"
• No. 8 (1901): "Martling's" in 1778 / The First Tammany Wigwam at the Corner of Spruce and Nassau Streets Where Meetings Were Held Until 1812
• No. 9 (1901): View of St. Paul's Church and Broadway Stages in 1831. With Site of the "Astor House," Corner of Vesey Street and Broadway
• No. 10 (1901): Broadway Between Fulton and Barclay Streets Before the Erection of the Astor House
• No. 11 (1902): The Residence of John Jacob Astor at Eighty-Fifth Street Near the East River, Where Washington Irving Wrote Astoria (small dot of foxing to upper left corner of image)
• No. 12 (1902): Exterior of the Old Niblo's Garden on Broadway, Before the Fire (some smudges/fingerprints around edges, large blank piece of paper pasted to rear of folder)

"Samuel Hollyer (1826-1919) was born in London, England, where he was trained as an engraver by the brothers Edward and William Finden. He came to the United States in 1851, and worked for various New York book publishers until 1860 when he returned to England to live.

Six years later, Hollyer came back to America, settling in Hudson Heights, near Guttenberg, New Jersey, a small community across the Hudson River from Manhattan. He commuted daily to his studio in New York, where he created line and stipple engravings, mezzotints, and etchings for various publications and print collectors. Bookplates were one of his specialties, as were portraits of literary celebrities.

Samuel Hollyer died in New York in December 1919, at the age of 93. His obituary in the New York Times described him as "one of the last, if not the very last, of the old school of line engravers (New York Historical Society)."