Tributes in Paper
from the City of Brotherly Love
Editor’s Note
Headline
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Acknowledgments
About the Author
1 Laura F. Sprague and Justin Wolff, eds., Rufus Porter’s Curious World: Art and Invention in America, 1815-1860 (Brunswick, Me.: Bowdoin College Museum of Art in association with the Pennsylvania State University Press, 2019), 15-16.
2 Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 15-17.
3 Rufus Porter, “Epitome of Experience and Practice,” Aerial Reporter 1, no. 20 (April 27, 1854), reprinted in Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 121-124.
4 Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 15; “Epitome, ” reprinted in Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 121, 123.
5 Laura Fecych Sprague, ed., Agreeable Situations: Society, Commerce, and Art in Southern Maine, 1780-1830 (Kennebunk, Me., The Brick Store Museum, 1987), 46–48; Moody owned Dolland’s achromatic refracting telescope; see John K. Moulton, Captain Moody and His Observatory (Falmouth: Mount Joy Publishing, 2000), 20, 23, 30–31.
6 Richard Candee, “‘The Appearance of Enterprise and Improvement:’ Architecture and the Coastal Elite in Southern Maine,” in Agreeable Situations, 83-34.
7 Constitution and History of the Maine Charitable Mechanic Association (Portland: Bryant Press, 1965), 3. Porter was not a member but would have benefited from its mission.
8 Quincy’s election as tythingman appears in Eastern Argus, November 24, 1810. “A Rare Mechanic,” Tribune and Bulletin, October 6, 1846, Maine Historical Society, courtesy of Earle G. Shettleworth Jr. “Epitome, ” reprinted in Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 122-23.
9 Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 16; see also Joseph W. Porter, A Genealogy of the Descendants of Richard Porter, Who Settled at Weymouth, Mass., 1635, and Allied Families: Also Some Account of the Descendants of John Porter (Bangor: Burr & Robinson, 1878), 285-287.
10 Portland Light Infantry, Record Book, 1803-1811, Maine Historical Society; the page with Porter’s signature is illustrated in Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 20; “Epitome,” reprinted in Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 123.
11 Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 19-20, 25-16.
12 Agreeable Situations, 36-37; respectively, Eastern Argus, April 9, 1807, and Eastern Argus, August 11, 1808.
13 Eastern Argus, December 10, 1816.
14 The McLellan portrait is in the collection of the Portland Museum of Art, 1972.71.
15 See n37 below; Agreeable Situations, 123-124; the discount appears in his advertisement, Portland Gazette, March 29, 1802. The likeness of Stephen Longfellow has been attributed to Roberts since it was published in 1987, see John Mayer and William David Barry, “A City Awakens: The Arts and Artists of Early 19th century Portland,” Maine Historical Society online exhibit: www.mainehistory.org
16 Agreeable Situations, 207-208. Skilled and day laborers earned one dollar per day. Twenty-five cents would have been less significant for a professional or member of the merchant class.
17 Others included Reverend Samuel Deane and Eunice Pearson Deane, his wife; see Agreeable Situations, 89-91.
18 Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 60.
19 Henry Cole Quinby, Genealogical History of the Quinby (Quimby) Family in England and America (New York, N.Y., 1915), 286-289.
20 Agreeable Situations, 91-92; Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 57-58.
21 Agreeable Situations, 48-49.
22 Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 16, 26-27.
23 Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, “‘From the Fair to The Brave’: Spheres of Womanhood in Federal Maine,” in Agreeable Situations, 222-223.
24 Benjamin Lease, That Wild Fellow John Neal and the Literary Revolution (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1972), 11; John Neal, Wandering Recollections of a Somewhat Busy Life: An Autobiography (Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1869), 38, 132, 185; Portland Gazette, April 29, 1811.
25 Neal’s Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine reviews from August 1824 to February 1825 are reprinted in Harold Edward Dickson, Observations on American Art: Selections from the Writings of John Neal (1793–1876) (State College: Pennsylvania State College, 1943), 26–37.
26 Joyce Butler, “Rising Like a Phoenix: Commerce in Southern Maine, 1775–1830,” in Agreeable Situations, 27–28, 52–53. Kenneth Thompson, an historian of Portland’s early forts, kindly assisted with this research. He argues that although Fort McHenry in Baltimore is more famous, the Portland forts were important deterrents at keeping the British at bay. Jamie Rice at the Maine Historical Society also shared helpful insights. “Epitome, ” reprinted in Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 123; Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 19, n48.
27 Agreeable Situations, 53-54. A description of the procession appeared in Eastern Argus, September 9, 1813. See also Candace Kanes, “Enemies at Sea, Companions in Death,” www.mainememory.net
28 Rufus Porter to Charles Norris, February 16, 1815, Baldwin, Me., with January 24, 1815, copyright notice, and Amos Cook to Charles Norris, September 24, 1812, Charles Norris Papers, Mss. 11, New England Historic Genealogical Society. See also Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 21-22, 24.
29 Abel Bowen, The Naval Monument: Containing Official and Other Accounts of All the Battles Fought Between the Navies of the United States and Great Britain During the Late War(Boston, Mass.: Abel Bowen, 1816). Within weeks of its publication, Portland booksellers advertised it for sale; see Portland Gazette and Maine Advertiser, June 25, 1816. For Bowen-Porter collaborations, see Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 26-28.
30 Agreeable Situations, 208-209.
31 Seth Clark, Business Ledger, 1815-1834, Maine Historical Society, Coll. 4061; Elder Family Papers, 1750-1805, Maine Historical Society, Coll. S-1871.
32 William David Barry kindly brought Moses Pierce’s activities to the author's attention. William David Barry, “Artists at Portland, Maine, 1784-1835: An Updated List of That Compiled for the Portland Museum of Art, 1976” (Maine Historical Society, typescript, 2007), n.p.; Lydia Foy, “New England and New York Portrait Makers in Canada, 1760-1860,” in Painting and Portrait Making in the American Northeast, ed. Peter Benes and Jane Montague Benes, Dublin Seminar for New England Folklife Annual Proceedings (Boston: Boston University, 1994), 114-115; Eastern Argus, October 11, 1815.
33 Eastern Argus, October 6, 1818.
34 Richard H. Saunders, John Smibert: Colonial America’s Portrait Painter (New Haven, Ct., Yale University Press, and the Barra Foundation, 1995), 210-211; Susan E. Wegner, “Copies and Education: James Bowdoin’s Painting Collection in the Life of the College,” in The Legacy of James Bowdoin III (Brunswick, Me.: Bowdoin College Museum of Art, 1994), 141-142.
35 Marvin Sadik, Colonial and Federal Portraits at Bowdoin College (Brunswick, Me.: Bowdoin College Museum of Art, 1966), 164-166. Charles C. Calhoun, A Small College in Maine: Two Hundred Years of Bowdoin (Brunswick, Me.: Bowdoin College, 1993), 53, 111-112.
36 Respectively, Eastern Argus, October 6, 1818; Eastern Argus, December 8, 1818. Unfortunately, Pierce’s copies have not been identified.
37 Stuart charged $100 for a 30-by-25-inch portrait, see Carrie Rebora Barratt and Ellen G. Miles, Gilbert Stuart (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2004), 204.
38 For more information, see www.nhhistory.org
39 Joseph C. Anderson, comp., “Portland, Maine, Marriage Intentions, 1814–1837,” Maine Genealogist 30, no. 1 (February 2008): 36; Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 21.
40 “Lane Family Register,” watercolor and ink on paper, Private Collection. Deborah M. Child, “Thank Goodness for Granny Notes: Rufus Porter and His New England Sitters,” Antiques and Fine Arts (Summer/Autumn 2010): 190–95.
41 Gardner W. Pearson, comp., Records of the Massachusetts Volunteer Militia Called Out by the Governor of Massachusetts to Suppress a Threatened Invasion During the War of 1812 (Boston: Wright and Potter, 1913), 175. Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 19, n48. Other Porter-attributed portraits with related details have been found in a private collection but, unfortunately, their sitters are not identified.
42 Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 22-23; Alfred Cole and Charles F. Whitman, History of Buckfield, Oxford County, Maine (Lewiston: Journal Printshop, 1915), 619. Unfortunately, Thomas’s miniature was cut down later for a smaller frame. For examples of the brush testing, see Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 67-69.
43 Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 12, 23; respectively, Portland Gazette, July 7, 1818; Hallowell Gazette (Me.), July 29, 1818.
44 Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 23. Porter’s first known advertisement for miniature painting appeared in the Middlesex Gazette (Concord, Mass.), February 5, 1820; he charged two dollars for likenesses that took ten minutes to complete. It is reproduced in Deborah M. Child, “Rufus Porter’s Miniature Portraits: Practice and Patrons,” in Rufus Porter’s Curious World, 69.
