The Lewis albums

In 1900 George Albert Lewis (Fig. 1) of Philadelphia, who had long been interested in genealogy, produced a magnificent album filled with handwritten text, watercolors, textiles, photographs, and ephemera documenting his family's 120-year history in the United States. This is one of many genealogical scrapbooks Lewis assembled, and he persuaded his wife, Anne Cornelia Larcombe Lewis, to compile an album as well. Five of these albums were generously donated to the Library Company of Philadelphia's print and photograph department in 2000 by the Lewises' great-grandson Oliver E. Allen. (1) While an interest in one's family history and the compilation of scrapbooks were not unusual during the late nineteenth century, the intensity with which Lewis engaged in this pastime and the magnificence of what he and his wife produced set their albums apart from the ordinary. (2)

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When the Lewises worked on their albums, many Americans were looking back to the colonial past with nostalgia. Architecture, decorative arts, and popular literature all reflected this interest in the colonial period. (3) "There is in these days, a wide spread and ever increasing interest in the past," Anne Lewis wrote in her album. "It permeates the entire community ... for in every part of our land, the spirit of inquiry appears to be awake, and multitudes are delving into public and private records, and in every conceivable way striving to learn more of their past history, and to connect the links already established, into a chain of ancestral continuity." (4)

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Americans who could document the fact that their ancestors met particular criteria established patriotic and hereditary societies. The Daughters and Sons of the American Revolution, the Pennsylvania Society of Colonial Dames of America, and the Pennsylvania Chapter of the Patriotic Sons of the Revolution, for example, were all formed in the 1880s and 1890s. (5) Also fueling an interest in the past was the series of centennial events celebrating iconic moments in American history beginning with the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia in 1876 and continuing with the centennials of the Constitution (1887), Washington's inauguration (1889), and Washington's death (1899). Philadelphia and other cities sponsored huge civic celebrations as a way to demonstrate American power and progress as well as to promote a homogeneous response to these important national events. (6)

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Genealogical societies were organized to help people delve into their families' histories, and in 1892 G. Albert Lewis became one of the earliest members of the Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania. He also served for at least fifteen years on the Committee of Genealogy for the Numismatic and Antiquarian Society of Philadelphia. As the grandson of a Hessian soldier, G. Albert pursued genealogy not from a desire for admittance to an American patriotic organization, but rather to relate the history of a family proud of both its German and American heritage. "As a boy," he wrote, "I was perhaps more curious and interested in all family history and events than others of the family." (7) He saved tickets to events, newspaper clippings, childhood art, pieces of fabric, among many other things, and used them to tell the story of his family. Other family members, knowing of his passion, sent him items of interest. (8) Anne Lewis, like her husband, saved material from her younger years and included these mementos in her album. A lace collar from her wedding dress, a letter written on her honeymoon, and a swatch of silk from a dress worn while she sat for a daguerreotype all found a place in her album.

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Creating scrapbooks of family memorabilia was not a surprising choice for the Lewises. Late nineteenth-century advice manuals promoted collecting objects and making scrapbooks as a worthwhile activity, particularly for children and women, since it fostered the skills of neatness, classification, and organization. (9)

Scrapbooks could be devoted to a particular subject, an individual, or class of objects such as postage stamps, photographs, or chromolithographic trade cards. The Library Company of Philadelphia has received many such scrapbooks. In 1882 Emily Phillips (1822-1909), for example, donated a scrapbook of more than one thousand trade cards relating to Philadelphia businesses. Philadelphia antiquarians such as John A. McAllister (see pp. 102-107), John McAllister Jr. (1786-1877), Charles A. Poulson (1789-1866), and John Fanning Watson (1779-1860), whose collecting passions are discussed elsewhere in this issue, all added immeasurably to our collections with their encyclopedic scrapbooks.

Of the Library Company's five Lewis albums, two stand out for the care and attention lavished upon them: G. Albert's 1900 album and the single album created by Anne, both illustrated in Figure 2. For these albums, the couple carefully thought out the order of their stories and selected appropriate artwork and ephemera to accompany their text. They probably wrote out the narratives elsewhere and copied them into the album, since there are almost no corrections in the many pages of text. (10) Pale pencil lines drawn across each blank page and later erased helped the couple keep their penmanship straight. G. Albert contributed many of his watercolors to Anne's album, causing Anne to declare that her story "would be of little interest without his numerous and varied illustrations." (11) He wrote the captions under her illustrations, but Anne's text is in her own handwriting.