Antique folk art sculpture Man with a Cap with Original Blue Paint and a Tin Visor. Collection Jim Linderman

Antique folk art sculpture Man with a Cap with Original Blue Paint and a Tin Visor. Collection Jim Linderman / Dull Tool Dim Bulb

Antique Pair of Folk Art Hand Carved Puppet Heads c. 1900 Collection Jim Linderman

Made for each other! A matching pain of puppet heads, carved by hand, circa 1900. Original paint. Collection Jim Linderman

Antique Original Pencil Drawings from a Stencil Set c. 1890 - 1910

A group we might call a meticulous menagerie. Antique Original Pencil Drawings from a Stencil Set. Drawn by hand on cheap lined paper. Still crisp considering age and acid. They come from a group of over fifty. Finding an original boxed stencil set seems difficult, but I have never seen such a large group of originals. I've cribbed a photo of a similar set from the web. Antique Original Pencil Drawings from a Stencil Set c. 1890 - 1910 Collection Jim Linderman

19th Century Calligraphy by Laura Trimble

Looks like Laura had to sqeeze her last name in here. An afterthought? Miniature Calligraphic drawing, c. 1890 Collection Dull Tool Dim Bulb / Jim Linderman

19th Century Folk Art Drawing "Group of Birds" by J.W. (Job Wagner) Pencil on Ruled Paper collection Dull Tool Dim Bulb

19th Century Folk Art Drawing "Group of Birds" by J.W (likely Job Wagner) Pencil on Ruled Paper collection Dull Tool Dim Bulb Thanks to Natalie Curley Antiques

Antique American Folk Art Drawing 19th Century "Meeting of the Old Man and his Grandson" collection Jim Linderman

Antique American Folk Art Drawing 19th Century "Meeting of the Old Man and his Grandson" Anonymous Collection Jim Linderman

Pair of Anonymous 19th Century Drawings collection Jim Linderman

Pair of Anonymous 19th Century Drawings collection Jim Linderman

Antique Folk Art Carved Wooden Horse and Cart 19th / early 20th c.

Antique Folk Art Carved Wooden Horse and Cart late 19th / early 20th c.  48 inches long, the horse is 21" tall and 24 inches long.  Child's riding size!  The largest pull toy I've even seen.  Original paint.  Handmade carriage is made of wood and shaped tin.  Found in Michigan 
Collection Jim Linderman 

The Normal Union System of Industrial Drawing 19th c. Watercolor Paintings

There were eight volumes of the incomprehensible Normal Union System of Industrial Drawing published by Sower Potts and Co. in 1878.  There were dozens of private "textbook" publishers at the time who sold technical manuals to schools and individuals.  The bulk of this one seems to be as simple as replicating simple designs in the blank spaces.  The written instructions require a microscope to read!  Obviously, our student didn't do very well, and upon failing it appears a younger sibling repurposed the pamphlet as a coloring book for watercolors.  Both fail.  A few pages of examples.  

National Union System of Industrial Drawing (5" x 9") 1878 with watercolor embellishments.  Collection Jim Linderman

19th Century Folk Art Train Drawing Forty Miles an Hour

19th Century Folk Art Train Drawing goes Forty Miles an Hour.  Edward Brown, 1883.
Courtesy Curley Antiques. 

An Early Panel Comic Strip drawn by Elizabeth Stohn Associated Art Studios Correspondence School for Cartoonists 1918

 

Continues Below

While this early, drawn by hand "comic" strip (or graphic novel if you like) is nearly 100 years old, the young woman who drew it had little to base her format on.  Dating to 1918 or so, there seems to have been only some 20 major published newspaper strips at the time being told in panels.  The Katzenjammer Kids, which appeared in 1897,  is credited as the first strip with a story told in panels.  Mutt and Jeff  came along ten years later.  The third major strip of the era, Krazy Kat, appeared in 1913. The character had been part of "The Dingbat Family" a few years before it appeared as a spin-off.

The other characteristic defining a comic strip is the use of "balloons" to carry conversations.  This has that as well.

 

Substantial strips of the early 20th century are far better known today than when they first appeared.  Research and compilations have documented them to an audience far larger than those who saw the original work on a regular basis. 

The artist here is a young woman named Elizabeth Stohn of Newburgh, New York.  This work was found with several sketchbooks filled with single drawings as well as an 88 page graphic novel drawn in 1921.  She had progressed, and some of the work from that book are shown below.

It appears her maturation was due to a correspondence school of art.  in 1924 she received somewhat persnickety  feedback from the Associated Art Studios in New York City.  Specifically from Mort Burger, who was director of the school of cartooning then located in the Flatiron Building.  Mr. Burger was a cartoonist himself, though maybe not much of one.  Comic historian Allan Holtz writes "Mort was a producer of small panel cartoons which peppered the daily papers of New York and other cities in the 1900s and 1910s. These mini-cartoons fell out of favor in the mid-teens and Burger turned to other cartooning pursuits like this school."  Well…I always wondered why artists taught art instead of making art.  Mort did both, but seems to have been slightly more successful teaching.  He tried performing on stage as well.  As also found by Allan Holtz, Mort was killed in an automobile accident just 6 months after the artist here received his letter of criticism!  It is not known how many working cartoonists the school turned out.  One can find numerous examples of the advertisements he placed in magazines, but little about any successful graduates.

Ms. Stohn seems to have seen her share of misery by an early age…and in fact "comic" strip is a misnomer.  Her strip works are lurid.  The earliest comic strips were often far from funny.  As David Kunzle writes "the early (pre-19th-century) strip was seldom comic either in form or in content, and many contemporary strips are in no sense primarily humorous. The terms comics and comic strip became established about 1900 in the United States, when all strips were indeed comic."   Still, if anything characterizes her strip work, it is perils of a young woman.  This and the larger book work are filled with abuse and violence. One hopes it was not autobiographical. But she was ahead of her time.

There is a Hedwig Stohn from Newburgh, NY listed as being born in 1880.  Father of Elizabeth?  Husband?  There is an Elizabeth Stohn born nearby in 1910, which would make the artist a child while doing the works shown here, and only 14 at the time of enrolling in the Associated Art Studios.  Possible but unlikely?  She passed in 1988, and could be our artist, if a precocious one. In an earlier post on Dull Tool Dim Bulb a drawing by the artist was shown requesting further information.  As yet, no response.  Should additional information be forthcoming, it would be nice to see the entire 88 page graphic novel  "From Poverty to Luxary" (sic) published!

Works by Elizabeth Stohn 1918 - 1924 Collection Jim Linderman
(You may also be interested in the BOOK Eccentric Folk Art Drawings by the Author.
available from Blurb.

19th Century Folk Art Drawing "Good Night" Anonymous

19th Century Folk Art Drawing "Good Night" Anonymous.  11" x 14" 
Collection Jim Linderman

Giving Thanks Folk Art Drawing 19th Century

Giving Thanks Folk Art Schoolgirl Drawing 1876
Collection Jim Linderman

19th Century Folk Art Tombstones in Michigan

19th Century Folk Art Tombstones in Michigan  Photographs by Jim Linderman

Homemade Handmade Book The Tenth Commandment 19th Century Folk Art Book

Manilla paper was developed in the 19th century and used as a cheap material for children's art projects.  This handmade book was bound with a piece of string.  I believe the Sunday school kids were "helped along" with numbers already scored, which was cut then laid out and glued by children.

19th Century Ten Commandments handmade book Collection Jim Linderman

Thanks to Curley's Antiques

See also the companion Blog old time religion

19th Century American Folk Art Drawing c. 1865 Collection Jim Linderman

19th Century American Folk Art Drawing c. 1865 Collection Jim Linderman

Now Available ECCENTRIC FOLK ART DRAWINGS OF THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURIES from Blurb.com.  FREE PREVIEW BELOW

Eccentric Folk Art Drawings of the 19th and 20th Centuries from the Linderman Collection

By Jim Linderman

19th Century Folk Art Drawing of a Woman with Bustle collection Jim Linderman

19th Century Folk Art Drawing of a Woman with Bustle (Emma Naylor) drawn on the reverse of an Ashtabula Railroad Company receipt dated 1866.  Collection Jim Linderman
SEE ALSO THE BOOK (and instant download Ebook) HERE for Orders and Free Preview

19th Century Folk Art Drawing American Centennial 1876

An extraordinary folk art drawing by Dennison W. Hammond of Sommerville, MA. 1876.  It  was drawn, in ink, on the front endpaper of an autograph / friendship book.  Collection Jim Linderman   Thanks to BOX LOT on Facebook.