Fifty years study of some of our most common ferns in their habitats : mostly at "Camptosorus" : 1883-1903-1930

Digital Facsimile

186 unnumbered leaves : illustrations, color map, samples ; 36 cm (loose leaves) in box 50 cm + 1 portfolio (12 numbered leaves of samples of pressed ferns) + 1 portfolio (10 unnumbered leaves of samples of pressed wildflowers)

"S. Fred Prince, a botanical illustrator and amateur scientist, is a largely unknown artist whose work on the American landscape demonstrates his eligibility to be considered in the lineage of self-taught illustrator-naturalists such as Mark Catesby and Genevieve Jones."--Abstract, Sarah Burke Cahalan and Jason W. Dean (2018). The Manuscript Works of S. Fred Prince (1857-1951). Archives of Natural History. 45.

Samuel Fred Prince (born Samuel Webb Prince) was a self-taught scientific and botanical illustrator and artist, working professionally as an illustrator for colleges and universities. Prince lived in and surveyed Marvel Cave, near present-day Branson, Missouri, from 1894 to 1898.

"Samuel George Prince and Alice Cordelia Little gave birth to their first child, Samuel Webb (later calling himself S. Fred), on 26 May 1857 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania[; died in 1949 at age 92]."--Sarah Burke Cahalan and Jason W. Dean (2018). The Manuscript Works of S. Fred Prince (1857-1951). Archives of Natural History. 45.

"S. Fred Prince left Chicago and came to the Ozarks as a bachelor homesteader in the 1880s. He roamed the wilderness of Missouri’s Stone County, climbed bluffs to find ferns, searched the hills for wildflowers and descended into the intricate grandeur of a great cavern"--Missouri Department of Conservation website.

"Kansas State Agricultural College hired the artist in 1919. The Princes [with wife Maude Ellen Higgenbotham] moved to Manhattan, Kan., where Fred Prince lived apart from his family in a light-filled studio in a rooming house. He worked on scientific illustrations, pressed fern specimens for his collection and painted"--Missouri Department of Conservation website.

"In 1904, Prince's article on the ferns of the Marble Cave [or Marvel Cave, west of Branson, Missouri] area was published in the American Fern Society's Fern Bulletin [article entitled "Some ferns of the cave region of Stone County, Missouri", v. 12, no. 3, July 1904, p. 72-77]"---Missouri Department of Conservation website.

"A lengthy manuscript on ferns is in the collection of the Garden Library of Dumbarton Oaks, Washington, D.C. The Oak Spring Garden Library, Upperville, Va., owns several manuscripts, including 207 watercolors of wildflowers Prince found around Marvel Cave in the 1890s"--Missouri Department of Conservation website.

The name "Camptosorus": "I named the spot 'Camptosorus' after one of the [ferns] - one of the most common"--Unnumbered leaf 2 [p. 10], Woodland Booke.

Some text leaves/pages have ink pen drawings of flora; some text leaves/pages interspersed with full-page ink pen drawings of flora.

Includes in portfolios pressed and dried plant specimens (ferns and wildfowers) mounted on sheets and taped to the leaves/pages; name of plant handwritten in ink pen next to plant.

Portfolio 2 at end: Souvenirs of Yellowstone, 10 unnumbered leaves of pressed wildflowers with ink pen handwritten identification of each wildflower; color cover title page with pressed fern; no text.

No bibliographical references included?

Lib. copy has at back of box portfolio 2 titled: Souvenirs of Yellowstone (10 unnumbered leaves of pressed wildflowers ; 36 cm). Lib. copy: leaf numbered 7 twice; leaves 23-30 omitted; leaves 41-49 omitted; leaf 60 omitted; leaf 129 omitted; leaf 170 numbered twice; leaves 186-189 omitted. Lib. copy page numbered 3 has a small, horizontal black/white/gray watercolor view of mountains (Ozarks?) signed S. Fred Prince. Lib. copy has handwritten in pencil on "Contents" leaf: The little people of the rocks; the wild flowers-included. Lib. copy leaves/pages hand numbered in pencil on upper left corner or upper right corner; blank leaves/pages chiefly unnumbered; numbered leaves/pages may be out of numerical sequence in box: "Contents" order followed; portfolio 1 pages have graphite numerals at bottom right corners. Lib. copy "Contents" and "Index" (no pagination in "Index") slightly differ. Lib. copy pressed fern specimens are at end and taped in place with slender pieces of white tape; ferns identified with ink pen handwriting; some ferns have blank paper as guard sheets between specimens from the Agriculture and Geography State Normal School, Warrensburg, Missouri. Lib. copy pressed wildflower specimens in Souvenirs of Yellowstone are taped in place with slender pieces of white tape; wild flowers identfied with ink pen handwriting. Lib. copy is "inconsistent in both numeration and collation, this manuscript consists of approximately 200 leaves (page numbers up to 224, with one page number used twice and 15 page numbers omitted) of illustrations and text, including an illustrated title page, an introduction to the Woodland Booke as a whole, numerous drawings of ferns and manuscript text on ferns, a map of the area around Marvel Cave, and a pasted-in watercolor of mountains. The work is unbound. In some cases, a full sheet of paper has been folded twice to create four leaves. In a majority of cases, the same full sheet has been cut in half, with each half folded once to create two leaves. In some cases the full sheet has been cut into four parts so that a loose leaf can be inserted. Housed with the work are two sets of pressed specimens, one consisting of twelve leaves of pressed ferns and the other consisting of ten leaves of pressed flowers. Among the pressed specimens are several examples of stationery from Prince’s time working [as] an assistant to S. A. Hoover in the Agriculture and Geography department of the State Normal School in Warrensburg, Missouri. The manuscript is written on at least four types of paper, the heaviest of which has a 1903 watermark and its leaves measure 14 13/16 x 10 3/4 inches [37.6 x 27.3 cm]. The three lighterweight papers are only slightly smaller, measuring 14 13/16 x 10 11/16 inches [37.6 x 27.2 cm]."---Sarah Burke Cahalan and Jason W. Dean (2018). The Manuscript Works of S. Fred Prince (1857-1951). Archives of Natural History. 45.

Ferns -- Missouri.; Ferns -- Missouri -- Identification.; Ferns -- Missouri -- Pictorial works.; Ferns -- Ozark Mountains.; Ferns -- Ozark Mountains -- Identification.; Ferns -- Ozark Mountains -- Pictorial works.; Ferns -- Specimens.; Wild flower -- Specimens.; Camptosorus rhizophyllus.; Botanical illustration -- United States -- 20th century.; Wild flowers -- Yellowstone National Park.; Wild flowers -- Yellowstone National Park -- Identification.; Wild flowers -- Yellowstone National Park -- Pictorial works.