Abel Bowen (1790-1850) was an engraver, publisher, and author in early 19th-century Boston, Massachusetts.
Biography
editBowen was born in New York in 1790.[1] Arriving in Boston in 1812, he worked as a printer for the Columbian Museum, at the time under the proprietorship of his uncle, Daniel Bowen.[2] In 1814 Abel married Eliza Healey of Hudson, New York.[3] Their children included Abel Bowen (d.1818).[4]
With W.S. Pendleton he formed the firm of Pendleton & Bowen, which ended in 1826.[5] He joined the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association in 1828.[6] In the 1830s Bowen and others formed the Boston Bewick Company, which published the American Magazine of Useful and Entertaining Knowledge. He lived and worked in Congress Square, ca.1823-1826;[7] in 1832 he kept his shop on Water Street, and lived on Union Street;[8] in 1849 he worked on School Street, and lived in Chelsea.[9]
Bowen taught Joseph Andrews, Hammatt Billings, George Loring Brown, B.F. Childs, William Croome, Nathaniel Dearborn, G. Thomas Devereaux, Alonzo Hartwell, Samuel Smith Kilburn, and Richard P. Mallory.[10][11] Contemporaries included William Hoogland.[12] His siblings included publisher Henry Bowen.
Works by Bowen
edit- Bowen, Abel (1816). The Naval Monument.
- Rufus Porter (c. 1822). Revolving Almanack. Billerica, Mass. Engraved by Abel Bowen.
- Bowen's Boston News-letter, and City Record. 1826.
- Early Impressions A novella published 1827, Bowles and Dearborn: Boston, and reprinted by Allen and Ticknor, Boston, 1833.
- Bowen's Picture of Boston, Boston: Abel Bowen, 1829, OCLC 76917747, OL 7113723M
- Young Ladies' Book. 1830.
Images
edit-
-
Office at Congress-Square; advertisement in Boston Directory, 1823 -
Engraving by Bowen of the Exchange Coffee House from Snow's History of Boston, 1828
References
edit- ^ Walter Hamilton. Dated book-plates (Ex libris) with a treatise on their origin and development. 1895.
- ^ Loyd Haberly (1959). "The Long Life of Daniel Bowen". New England Quarterly. 32 (3): 320–332. doi:10.2307/362826. JSTOR 362826.
- ^ Boston Gazette, July 21, 1814
- ^ Columbian Centinel, Sep 30, 1818
- ^ Boston News-Letter, Feb 4, 1826
- ^ Annals of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association. 1853.
- ^ Boston Directory. 1823.
- ^ Boston Directory. 1832.
- ^ Boston Directory. 1849.
- ^ Frank Weitenkampf (1912). American Graphic Art. H. Holt and Company.
- ^ Potter's American Monthly, 1873
- ^ "Miniature portraits of the Marquis Lafayette", Boston Commercial Gazette, Aug 23, 1824
Further reading
edit- Joseph Sabin, ed. (1869). "Bowen". Bibliotheca Americana. Vol. 2. New York. OCLC 13972268.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - William H. Whitmore (1887), "Abel Bowen", Bostonian Society Publications, vol. 1
External links
edit
- WorldCat. Bowen, Abel 1790-1850
- Young Ladies' Book, excerpts. 1830.
- American paintings & historical prints from the Middendorf collection, an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Bowen (no. 74)