I first discovered these fascinating and beautiful illustrations for school room charts on the blog of“The Public Domain Review” which you can read more about after the images.
The charts were designed by American Woman Orra White Hitchcock between 1828 and 1840. Although designed as a teaching aid as scientific school charts, they wouldn’t look out of place in a contemporary art gallery.
You can read more about story of Orra White Hitchcock on the link to the Public Domain Review page above, as well as viewing more of the illustrations by going to their source, in the collection of Amhurst College linked from the Public Domain Review post. There are a total of 61 images of these glorious illustrations.
From the about page of the Public Domain Review:
Founded in 2011, The Public Domain Review is an online journal and not-for-profit project dedicated to the exploration of curious and compelling works from the history of art, literature, and ideas……..the focus is on works now fallen into the public domain, that vast commons of out-of-copyright material that everyone is free to enjoy, share, and build upon without restriction. Our aim is to promote and celebrate the public domain in all its abundance and diversity, and help our readers explore its rich terrain……….With a focus on the surprising, the strange, and the beautiful, we hope to provide an ever-growing cabinet of curiosities for the digital age, a kind of hyperlinked Wunderkammer – an archive of content which truly celebrates the breadth and diversity of our shared cultural commons and the minds that have made it.
Print Paper Press 