1955 Della Hoss Pictorial Bird's Eye View Map of Yosemite National Park, California

Della Taylor Hoss (June 3, 1900 - February 19, 1997) was an American artist, printmaker, illustrator, and painter. Born in Harvey, Illinois to the painter John S. Taylor (1858 - 1927) a young Della Taylor moved with her family to Los Angeles. She graduated from Stanford University in 1923 and thereafter matriculated into the California School of Fine Arts in San Francisco (now the San Francisco Art Institute). She subsequently continued her education at the National School for Fine and Applied Arts in Washington, D.C. Her art, particularly her early work, highlighted her love of nature and landscape. She was the illustrator of Mary Curry Tresidder's The Trees of Yosemite, published in 1932. In her 70s, she produced a series of pencil and charcoal drawings of bristlecone pines. Della Taylor married Herman H. Hoss, who was a Federal Magistrate and Treasurer of the Yosemite Park and Curry Company. They lived in the Yosemite Valley from 1928 until 1942, after which they moved to Palo Alto, California. Herman died in 1968, and Della remarried in 1983 to Hilmer Oehlmann, who died in 1983. Art and a love of national parks ran in her family. Her brother, Frank Taylor (1894 - 1972), wrote the book Oh Ranger! A Book About the National Parks. Her sister Ruth Taylor White, became an important pictorial mapmaker in her own right. A third sister, Bernice Taylor Fitzgerald, was also an artist, but did not make maps. More by this mapmaker...