Geological Landmark: Point of Rocks in the Ancient Lake Colorado Desert, 1856

Name: Geological Landmark: Point of Rocks in the Ancient Lake Colorado Desert, 1856
Brand: American Maps and Prints
SKU: BG-14038-62
Price: 245 USD
Availability: InStock

$245

€220 · dollar price at today's exchange rate

Buy now Ask a question

Shipping to the United States: $51 standard, $73 express, insured and tracked.

Date: 1856
Kind: Views & Engravings
Size: 20.7 × 28.3 cm (8.1 × 11.1 in)
Period: Westward Expansion & Civil War
Places: California
Reference: BG-14038-62

What the condition grades mean

Excellent: Bright and clean, with no faults worth mentioning.
Very good: Only light signs of age, such as faint toning.
Good: Normal signs of age for a sheet of this period: toning, some foxing, small marks or neat old repairs.
Fair: Clear faults such as staining, tears or repairs, priced to match.

Every fault we see is written in the condition note, and the whole sheet is shown uncropped in the photos.

Guaranteed original. This is an original of the period stated, not a later reproduction or print-on-demand copy. If it is ever shown to be otherwise, we refund you in full.

Shipping to the United States. Sent from our gallery in Langweer, the Netherlands, flat between boards or rolled in a tube, and fully insured. Delivery and import charges.

About this piece

Boulders crusted with lime in the bed of an ancient lake, an original tinted lithograph from the Pacific Railroad Surveys, issued in 1856. The caption reads "Point of Rocks covered with a Calcareous Incrustation", with the subtitle "Ancient Lake Colorado Desert". The credit "Chr. Koppel" is at lower left and "T. Sinclair's lith. Phila." at lower right. The header reads "U.S.P.R.R. Exp. & Surveys, Cal." and the sheet is numbered as a Geology plate.

A mound of rounded boulders stands at the center of a flat, pale desert plain, with a second, smaller heap at the right and scattered stones across the ground. In the foreground at left a surveyor, with his horse, raises a hammer to a cracked, hollow boulder, and other broken pieces lie around him. The tints are a warm sandy buff against a pale sky.

The plate was drawn for the geological reports of the California survey, where the lime-encrusted rocks marked the shoreline of the ancient lake of the Colorado Desert. It was published in Reports of Explorations and Surveys, to Ascertain the Most Practicable and Economical Route for a Railroad from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean.

★