Lithograph

Description

Lithograph showing bird's eye view of the Shaker village at Alfred, ME. The village road runs diagonal across the print and the Church Family is in the foreground. The view was based upon a drawing made by artist Phares F. Goist, and it was published in History of York County, Maine: With Illustrations and Biographical Sketches of its Prominent Men and Pioneers, 1880. This was one of a series of gazetteers made of populous Maine counties; each volume featured drawings of every town and village in each counties, including the Shaker villages.

Notes

The journal of the Church Family at Alfred noted on January 29, 1880 that, "Phares F. Goist the artist came to day and took a Bird's-eye view of our beautiful Shaker Home which is to be inserted in the forthcoming History of York. Co." On February 2, the according to the same journal, "The Artist Phares Fulton Goist, who came on the 29th last to take a picture of our village, came this afternoon with it perfected. It is correctly and beautifully executed and we all admire it." The Shakers purchased two copies of the published book as well as 200 copies of the prints. The illustrations were later reproduced by the Shakers in The Shaker Manifesto and in Giles Avery's Sketches of Shakers and Shakerism.