1913 Rummell Bird's-Eye View of Dartmouth College, New Hampshire

This is a rare c. 1913 Richard Rummell bird's-eye view of Dartmouth College, New Hampshire. The view looks northeast on Dartmouth from the intersection of Main Street and Wheellock. The Dartmouth Green with its distinctive path structure takes center stage. Dartmouth Hall (1906), with its iconic bell tower, appears at right. Just to the left, Webster Hall (1907), with its colonnaded entrance, is recognizable. The Collis Center (1902) appears in the lower left.

Rummell University Views

Rummell was an American landscape artist known for his drawings of American universities. At the turn of the century, Littig and Company commissioned Rummell to prepare watercolors of some of the nation's most prestigious colleges. From these watercolors, copperplates were engraved, and a limited number of engravings were issued. Most of Rummell's university views are strikingly similar in style, revealing the entire campus in panoramic splendor. The views are uniformly issued from an altitude of about 300 feet, suggesting the Rummell most likely worked from a balloon. Rummell views appear in full-size, half-size, and quarter-size, both colored and uncolored. Typically, the uncolored sepia-toned images bearing Rummell's pencil signature and the Littig imprint are considered the first editions, but not all his college views are known thus. Some of the views were acquired from Littig and reissued. It is also possible to find proof states lacking the name of the college below the image.

Publication History and Census

This view was originally published as a photogravure print by A. W. Elston of Boston and W. T Littig in 1906. The present example removes the Littig imprint, adds color, the Rummell signature in the lower right, and a vignette of Dartmouth Hall (1906) in the lower left. We also note a later reprint by Victorious and Cody, c. 1946. The present example, although undated, was most likely printed around 1913. Dartmouth represents one of the scarcer Rummell views, and this issue has no recorded market history. We note multiple examples in the Dartmouth College collections but none elsewhere.