Book:Forty etchings, from sketches made with the camera lucida, in North America, in 1827 and 1828

No camera? No problem - just draw your own pictures. From 1827 to 1828, Captain Basil Hall of the British Royal Navy took a sightseeing tour throughout the United States. Since photography wouldn't exist for another decade, Capt. Hall had to rely on his own talents. These, he admits, were limited. Fortunately, British scientist William H. Wollaston had invented the "camera lucida" 20 years earlier, in 1807. In the 19th century, the camera lucida became a popular drawing aid among both amateur and professional artists who wanted to create accurate drawings of nature. The simple device is based on a prism that allows anyone to trace reflected images of objects onto paper. Emerging from the widespread popular interest in nature at the beginning of the 19th century, today this book is perhaps more valuable for its photographically accurate images of America at the beginning of the 19th century. After beginning with the typical tourist attraction of Niagara Falls, Hall turned to more mundane topics: the growing cities and open countryside of the young nation. He even included drawings of characters he met along the way: soldiers, squatters, slave drivers, and Native Americans.