THE BLUEFISH print ( Pomatomus saltatrix)

These very beautiful and very rare folio chromolithographic plates are from “The Fishes of North America,” by editor and author, William C. Harris, and professional artist, John L. Petri. Published in New York in 1898.

To accomplish this outstanding work, Harris and Petri travelled over 28,000 miles across America, from the eastern U.S. to Washington’s Spokane river to the Gulf of Mexico to obtain living specimens from their native waters to illustrate.

Harris was determined to present a work that accurately reproduced the fishes colours and sheen before they faded, and as soon as he caught one on rod and line, Petri would immediately be ready to paint it in oils.

These illustrations were then reproduced by chromolithography, using as many as fifteen shades of colours to ensure they were all, “minutely accurate in anatomical detail and in the more difficult matter of coloration.” (Harris)

The plates were printed by at least two firms, the majority by Armstrong & Co, (The Riverside Press) of Cambridge, Maa., others are signed by Geo. H. Walker & Co, Boston.

Along with Kilbourn and Goode’s 1879 “Fishes of the United States”, “The Fishes of North America” is regarded as one of the two greatest ichthyological works of the 19th century, with “very beautifully drawn and color printed plates of fishes.”

(ref, Bennett, Nissen ZBI, Wetzel))