Abel_Bowen

Abel Bowen

Abel Bowen

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Abel Bowen (1790-1850) was an engraver, publisher, and author in early 19th-century Boston, Massachusetts.

Portrait of Abel Bowen

Biography

Bowen was born in New York in 1790.[1] Arriving in Boston in 1812, he worked as a printer for the Columbian Museum, at the time under the proprietorship of his uncle, Daniel Bowen.[2] In 1814 Abel married Eliza Healey of Hudson, New York.[3] Their children included Abel Bowen (d.1818).[4]

With W.S. Pendleton he formed the firm of Pendleton & Bowen, which ended in 1826.[5] He joined the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association in 1828.[6] In the 1830s Bowen and others formed the Boston Bewick Company, which published the American Magazine of Useful and Entertaining Knowledge. He lived and worked in Congress Square, ca.1823-1826;[7] in 1832 he kept his shop on Water Street, and lived on Union Street;[8] in 1849 he worked on School Street, and lived in Chelsea.[9]

Bowen taught Joseph Andrews, Hammatt Billings, George Loring Brown, B.F. Childs, William Croome, Nathaniel Dearborn, G. Thomas Devereaux, Alonzo Hartwell, Samuel Smith Kilburn, and Richard P. Mallory.[10][11] Contemporaries included William Hoogland.[12] His siblings included publisher Henry Bowen.

Works by Bowen

  • Bowen, Abel (1816). The Naval Monument.
  • Rufus Porter (c. 1822). Revolving Almanack. Billerica, Mass. Engraved by Abel Bowen.
  • Bowen's Boston News-letter, and City Record. 1826.
  • Early Impressions A novella published 1827, Bowles and Dearborn: Boston, and reprinted by Allen and Ticknor, Boston, 1833.
  • Bowen's Picture of Boston, Boston: Abel Bowen, 1829, OCLC 76917747, OL 7113723M
  • Young Ladies' Book. 1830.

Images

  • The Wasp Boarding the Frolic. Bowen's The Naval Monument, 1816
  • Office at Congress-Square; advertisement in Boston Directory, 1823
  • Engraving by Bowen of the Exchange Coffee House from Snow's History of Boston, 1828

References

  1. [1]
    Walter Hamilton. Dated book-plates (Ex libris) with a treatise on their origin and development. 1895.
  2. [2]
    Loyd Haberly (1959). "The Long Life of Daniel Bowen". New England Quarterly. 32 (3): 320–332. doi:10.2307/362826. JSTOR 362826.
  3. [3]
    Boston Gazette, July 21, 1814
  4. [4]
    Columbian Centinel, Sep 30, 1818
  5. [5]
    Boston News-Letter, Feb 4, 1826
  6. [6]
    Annals of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association. 1853.
  7. [7]
    Boston Directory. 1823.
  8. [8]
    Boston Directory. 1832.
  9. [9]
    Boston Directory. 1849.
  10. [10]
    Frank Weitenkampf (1912). American Graphic Art. H. Holt and Company.
  11. [11]
    Potter's American Monthly, 1873
  12. [12]
    "Miniature portraits of the Marquis Lafayette", Boston Commercial Gazette, Aug 23, 1824

Further reading

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