Welcke, Robert A. (fl. 1876 - c. 1940)

Robert A. Welcke (fl. 1876 – c. 1940) was a photolithographer active in New York in the latter part of the 19th century and early 20th century. Welcke was a Prussian immigrant, who emigrated to New York City from Wronki, Province of Posen, Prussia, in the 1870s. After he arrived, Welcke went into business with his brother, Edward Welcke, in New York City, who had arrived a decade earlier. After a split between the brothers during an economic depression in the late 1870s, Robert Welcke elected to continue in business on his own. Welcke's firm, Robert A. Welcke Offset Company, was based at 176 William Street. Welcke's corpus of work ranges from maps of New York and Connecticut to illustrations on Flemish Renaissance interiors to government maps and brochures to decorative sheet music covers. Following Welcke's death the firm was taken over by his daughter, Olga Welcke, who alongside William Jugens managed the firm until the outbreak of World War II.