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I’m New Here: Still Learning… Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper

I am always ready to learn although I do not always like being taught.   Winston S. Churchill

This is an appropriate enough quote to summarize my perspective at the close of a year of many new lessons – and not all of them pleasant at the time of learning.  It’s tough to be new, but it feels great to be not-new.  Since I find myself in a “next stage” here at Rare Newspapers, as of this week I am transitioning the title(s) of my blog.  Once a month I will continue to pass along something new I have learned, under the heading “Still Learning.” In the other three weeks I will focus on different aspects of this wonderful place.

My most recent orientation was a byproduct of searching the wide world of Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper [1].  It seems these treasures, similar in size to Harper’s Weekly [2], are located in a completely different collection of Civil War Era papers.   Although our titles are meticulously indexed and cataloged, the facilities could not possibly be rearranged with each new collection acquired.  Consequently, the front warehouse has its own area of 1861-1865 issues, while the annex has a separate one.  It’s so funny to still be discovering a nook packed full of Historical Relevance (in capital letters).

Within a publication from 1862, I located a four-panel, tipped-in centerfold. It’s a beautiful illustration that measures 20″ high by 32″ wide, folded inside the magazine, with no binding holes or glue lines within the image margins.  The top half is titled “The Second Day of the Second Battle of Bunker Hill”, and depicts a lovely landscape in which lines of marching men wind along hilltops and alongside lanes of trees.  Even the award winning photography of later wars doesn’t compete with the impact of this intricate rendering.

Note that this is not a double-page centerfold, as I originally described it to Guy, but a more extravagantly sized and highly desirable four-panel, tipped-in centerfold.  I have recently been taught the difference.

Anyway, I have much more to learn, but in case you were wondering, I am ready for more Leslie’s requests — particularly Civil War issues.