Lehman, George “Fairmount Waterworks/From the Basin"

George Lehman.  “Fairmount Waterworks/From the Basin.” 

Philadelphia: C. G. Childs & R.H. Hobson, 1829.  7 7/8 x 9 3/4.  Aquatint.  Some foxing in the outer right margin. Else, very good condition.  A/A

George Lehman was a Philadelphia painter, engraver, lithographer and publisher from the late 1820s until his death in 1870.  Born in Lancaster County, Lehman exhibited some of his drawings at the Pennsylvania Academy between 1825 and 1831.  About 1831 he worked as a lithographer for Childs & Inman, later forming publishing partnerships with C.G. Childs and P.S. Duval.

Lehman’s entree into the print world seems to have been the series of Philadelphia views he drew and etched for C.G. Childs & R.H. Hobson in 1829.  This was at a time when Childs was completing his famous Views of Philadelphia, and the success of that venture perhaps inspired Childs to commission the new prints from Lehman.  These prints are of a slightly larger size than Childs’ other prints, and they are etched with the more elaborate method of aquatinting.