Talk:John Foster (printer)

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by SL93 (talk) 01:33, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

(

• Comment or view
• Article history

)

First engraving produced in colonial America

• ... that John Foster, a Boston printer, produced an engraving of Richard Mather in 1669, the first printing produced in colonial America?  Sources: Roark, 2003, pp. 22, 32, Malone, 1935, p. 549
  • Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Russian torture chambers in Ukraine
  • Comment: Statement and sources supporting hook are found in the 2nd paragraph in the Career section

5x expanded by Gwillhickers (talk). Self-nominated at 03:15, 11 October 2022 (UTC).

General: Article is new enough and long enough
New enough: Long enough:

Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Adequate sourcing: Neutral: Free of copyright violations, plagiarism, and close paraphrasing:

Hook eligibility:

• Cited: - Offline/paywalled citation accepted in good faith
• Interesting:
• Other problems: - I think there's a typo in the hook--"printing" for "print." I'd suggest using the phrasing in the article, "the first print created in the American colonies," or, perhaps more clearly, "the first printed image" or "the first portrait print."

Image: Image is freely licensed, used in the article, and clear at 100px.
Freely licensed: Used in article: Clear at 100px:

QPQ: Done.

Overall: Just needs some clarifying of the hook and should be ready to go. Nice expansion. blameless 03:06, 14 October 2022 (UTC)

• @Blameless:  Done
  ALT2 ... that John Foster, a Boston printer, produced an engraving of Richard Mather in 1669, the first print produced in colonial America? -- Gwillhickers (talk) 03:24, 14 October 2022 (UTC)
  • Great. Then a from me. blameless 03:29, 14 October 2022 (UTC)
    • @Gwillhickers: could you talk me through the sourcing here? The Dictionary of American biography seems to say that it was "as early as 1671", whereas Roark doesn't seem to want to pin a date to it at all. theleekycauldron (talk • contribs) (she/her) 23:27, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

• No one has affixed an exact date on Foster's work, hence the statement "as early as 1671." Wroth, 1938, p. 284, also says in reference to a 1670 work, that "It is, indeed, accepted and acknowledged as the earliest engraved and printed American portrait." In light of that perhaps I should change the year date from 1671 to 1670. I'll look to other sources, just in case there is still an issue here. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 00:16, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

• Yeah, we need to resolve the date issue before this can be promoted. Roark says "c. 1670", so perhaps that's what we should say too? -- RoySmith (talk) 22:24, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

• @RoySmith:  Done

ALT3... that John Foster, a Boston printer, produced an engraving of Richard Mather in 1670, the first printing produced in colonial America? -- Gwillhickers (talk) 17:33, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

ALT3a... that John Foster, a Boston printer, produced an engraving of Richard Mather in c. 1670, the first printing produced in colonial America? -- RoySmith (talk) 17:50, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

• @Blameless: — We had an item that needed attention, which has been addressed. Could you take another look at the review? We're going to go with ALT3a. Thanx -- Gwillhickers (talk) 20:43, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

• Yes, I agree that the less precise date is safer, based on the sources. My slight preference would be to write out "circa" rather than using the template, but that's not a big deal. blameless 01:26, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

• @Blameless: — Thanks, I believe we need another 'good to go' icon to get this passed on. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 03:14, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

• ! blameless 03:33, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

Subsequent discussion

Career

I think there is a wee typo here: >In 1768, he acquired a new font of type... Either that or he lived to a really ripe old age. Weka511 (talk) 06:41, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Foster the engraver and printer

@Johnbod: — I'm not understanding why this is such a big issue for you, which seems to be based on an opinion, from whence it is derived I have no idea. Engravings can be effected on metal or wood. Regardless, virtually all the sources refer to Foster as an engraver, and his several works as engravings:

• "Mr. Foster had a natural tal ent for drawing and sketching, and very early in his life became interested in wood-engraving.", <Littlefield, 1907, v. 2, p. 4>
• "Boston as early as 1665. His first engraving is supposed to be the portrait of Rev. Richard Mather..."<Littlefield, 1907, v. 2, p. 4>
• "John Foster : the earliest American engraver and the first Boston printer". Title of book, Green, 1909.
• "FOSTER, JOHN (1648-Sept. 9, 1681), engraver, printer, was the second son...."<Malone, 1932, v. 6, p.549>
• "As early as 1671 he "took up engraving as an avocation," and became the earliest wood-engraver of English America."<Malone, 1932, v. 6, p.549>
• "Foster..a scholar, a thinker, a printer, engraver..."<Roark, 2003, p. 19>
• "Foster probably created the wood engraving of Mather as a visual eulogy for the great minister..."<Roark, 2003, p. 19>
• "The quality of Foster's lines in the Mather print suggests that he began his career using a knife rather than a tool made specifically for wood engraving."<Roark, 2003, p. 26>
• "This refers to a small circular wood engraving by Foster of an Indian holding a large bow..."<Roark, 2003, p. 26>
• "As John Foster, our first engraver, was the printer of the book, it is generally conceded that he engraved the map."<Hamilton, 1953, p. 177>
• "The "White Hills" Map, which Foster must have cut in his twenty-ninth year, is crudely drawn and engraved,"<Hamilton, 1953, p. 179>
• "It has been suggested by Dr. Samuel A. Green that this cut, and a later one which we will consider shortly, were engraved by John Foster who had done some wood engraving for Green prior to 1672..."<Jones, 1934, p. 20>
• (Foster, John, 1648-1681, engraver)
• The First Map Engraved and Published in New England; "This was the first map engraved and published in New England
• Newspaper article, New York Tribune: Princeton gets rare 1670 engraving

Also, it wasn't very considerate to wipe out all my last edits, and a reliable source, without a discussion, just to make a point, which you have yet to substantiate. If you feel Foster has "never engraved ANYTHING", then it is incumbent on you to hold up your end, rather than to assert just an opinion while in the process of resorting to multiple reverts in an attempt to make the point. Please cease from this unnecessary edit war, as again, the sources more than substantiate that Foster was an engraver, and that the works in question were the product of engraving. I will be restoring the accurate account shortly but would first like to give you the opportunity to look at the sources more carefully so as to avoid another disruptive revert. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 03:09, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

If you want to know "from whence it is derived" look at User:Johnbod#Prints for my resources. The trouble is that none of your sources seem to be sufficiently well-informed about printmaking - Foster's few crude efforts mainly being interesting for being early and so on. NO - engraving uses metal plates, and woodcut carved wood blocks. The first is an intaglio printing technique, and the second uses relief printing, which is totally different. Wood engraving, using a sort of engraving technique on wood, was only invented c. 1797 by Thomas Bewick. All this is printmaking 101, and can easily be checked at the refs and links on those articles, or via google. An article on Foster should not be using the word "engraving" at all, anywhere. The 1907 and 1909 sources can be excused, as these terms were often used loosely 115 years ago, but Roark in 2003 has no such excuse. He is I suppose a general historian or journalist who has not troubled himself to learn the proper terms, or has just lazily followed the old old sources, and is not an RS in this respect. The same goes for the others. What do museums say - curators are usually trained in this sort of thing? Johnbod (talk) 04:45, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Even your own referral to the (intaglio printing) article says "Normally, copper or in recent times zinc sheets, called plates, are used as a surface or matrix, and the incisions are created by etching, engraving, drypoint, aquatint...etc." And your other referral (Wood engraving) has for its title the very term of Engraving. Also, we are talking about John Foster's time, where the other forms of engraving had yet to materialize. i.e.The art of engraving covers a rather long time period, and as such, the term engraving is not near as rigid as you're suggesting. Like painting, it took on several forms and techniques over the years and continues to do so. In any case, I will go by what the many sources have said in regards to Foster and his time, which you are free to regard as not well informed. This is how the article was presented in the DYK presentation, with hook and image caption that used the well sourced term of engraving. Last, your final revert wiped out a lot of biographical information, a source and upgraded referral to the Smithsonian featuring a stamp with Foster's image of Mather. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 19:59, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Double huh!? Engraving is an intaglio printing technique, as I said above. "where the other forms of engraving had yet to materialize" - what is that supposed to mean? Examples? Your sources, even the ones that aren't too old, are essentially local history, and we know how reliable that is. I have no objections to the historical additions, which you can easily re-add piecemeal after I restore the correct version. The only reason the article and hook reached DYK in this state is because I only saw the article and objected too late (my three posts here). If you think a DYK appearance is some sort of guarantee of article quality, you obviously don't spend much time there. Johnbod (talk) 21:14, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

You would have to of had a basis for such an objection, and for someone who has as many DYK noms that passed as you it's a little telling that all the sudden you're trying to talk the whole process down, including all the reviewers involved. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 21:41, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Telling of what? And how? Nobody thinks DYK provides specialist reviews, and complaints about errors getting through are extremely regular. It would have been pulled if it had not already run. I'll deal with the rest of your points later. Johnbod (talk) 06:32, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• Additional: Another one of your references The Renaissance Print, 1470-1550, refers to engraving in multiple instances, and in particular, to wood engraving, a source which is listed at the top of your (User:Johnbod#Prints). -- Gwillhickers (talk) 20:37, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Of course, half the book is on engraving, ON METAL, the most important Renaissance technique!! I'm looking at page 23, the solitary use of "wood engraving", where a perfectly conventional definition of that is given. The author considers whether it was used in the Renaissance, and finds no evidence it was. Johnbod (talk) 21:13, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

References are also made to "wood engraving" on pages 421, and 425. No matter, you contention that there is no usch thing as wood engraving is unfounded, and more over your assertion that Foster "never engraved ANYTHING" is equally absurd, and flies in the faces of multiple sources. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 21:41, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

"you contention that there is no usch thing as wood engraving is unfounded" (double sic). It was I who pointed out wood engraving. My contention is that they exist but are not the same as woodcuts, which were what Foster produced. That's why they have different articles, which you would benefit from reading. In the Landau, 421 & 425 are just titles of works in the bibliography, the 421 one from 1837. Johnbod (talk) 06:32, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• Another one of the sources, listed second in your list, An Introduction To A History Of Woodcut, Hind, 1963, volume 1 refers to wood-engraving. Example: On page 10, it says "...to the Front piece of a Dutch book of 1729, so that it seems that wood-engraving proper was a common practice at that period."
  In Hind's volume 2, p. 487 (back page), its says, "The central purpose of this important work of art history is to survey the origins and early developments of woodcut and wood engraving. " -- Gwillhickers (talk) 20:57, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• Yes, Arthur Mayger Hind - to quote our bio "His classic introductory books A [Short] History of Engraving and Etching (1908) and An Introduction to a History of Woodcut (1935) continued to be reprinted for decades by Dover Publications." It probably puzzles you that he bothered to write two very long books on what according to you are exactly the same thing! Do these uses you have found have any bearing at all on whether "wood engraving" is the correct term to describe anything Foster ever produced? If you think you are finding anything to support your usages you are wrong. Johnbod (talk) 21:29, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

One of your original contentions was that engravings only occur on metal. Now listen to you. This is getting argumentative and really tacky. I have supplied multiple sources that support Foster's involvement with wood engraving. I have even used some of your own sources that say wood engraving has been around for a long time. If you think you have some sort of case otherwise, that Foster "never engraved ANYTHING", you can always appeal to a notice board. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 21:43, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

"Now listen to you". What's your point here? Engravings are on metal. Johnbod (talk) 06:32, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

To quote you above "I'm not understanding why this is such a big issue for you" - you obviously don't pretend to know anything at all about printmaking (as each successive post here shows more clearly), yet you have chosen to write an article on someone mainly notable as a printmaker. Someone who does understand the area comes along and kindly goes to the trouble of correcting all your mistakes, and you just resist all the way. Why? I hope it will not be necessary to take this further, but I am perfectly ready to do so. Johnbod (talk) 21:48, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Foster is noted mostly for producing the first imprint made from a wood engraving in the British American colonies, and multiple sources support that, some of which are quoted above. And propping yourself up at my expense is only serving to amuse yourself and adds nothing to your position, such that it is. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 22:06, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

• At last, I see Princeton Library know what they are talking about - "woodcut" all the way, except when quoting journalists from 50+ years ago. Think on that! Johnbod (talk) 19:40, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• Yes, that article in two instances mentions "engraving", and though they are quoting, they thought well enough of them to feature them in their article. Woodcut and wood-engraving, have their distinctions, but they all share one major thing in common: They are plates that have been carved out, where ink is applied, and a print made thereof, so there is no concrete wall of separation between the two ideas. Many of the sources use the two terms together, i.e.woodcut engraving or wood engraving, and the article has links to all the terms in question. The Wood engraving article also refers to "wood engraving" as "Functionally a variety of woodcut.." Those more interested in the printing techniques involved than they are the history on Foster can go to the given articles and read the finer details, but since the sources for Foster use the term wood-engraving or woodcut engraving, that is what the article on Foster should say. If we only use sources that say "woodcut" we will be ignoring at least twelve sources on Foster. The lede also says, "A self-taught pioneer in American printmaking in woodcut", so no idea is being ignored. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 21:47, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• I changed the term in the caption for the Mather image as simply a woodcut, as this is what the source for Foster, in this instance, refers to it as. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 22:13, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
• Added footnote in the lede for clarity, and changed the link to woodcut. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 23:16, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

• Now I've actually seen Roark, she is unequivocal that "The Mather print, like all of Foster's images, is a woodcut" (p. 26), going on to describe the technique well. This is all I have been saying. Let's get the terminology of the article fully into the 21st (or 20th really) century. Johnbod (talk) 23:32, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

We're talking about the art as it existed in the 17th century, and it is often described as "woodcut engraving", or simply as "engraving". This has been clarified more than enough in the lede and the lede image, as well as elsewhere in the article. Multiple reliable sources refer to it as "engraving" , which is an age old art that took on different forms and is obviously not confined to some 21st century interpretation from afar, which would include 21st century technology. This is something a few modern day historians attempt to do -- trying to describe ideas and events of the past with their own present day experiences. The term is obviously a figurative one in many cases. The term "woodcut engraving" more than distinguishes the idea from the other types of engraving. This has been addressed as well as can be expected without ignoring or reading our own opinions into what the sources say. If an engraver only produces engravings, then how do we refer to Foster — as a woodcutter? Is there a more befitting noun for him? - Gwillhickers (talk) 18:40, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

No, no, no, no! We're talking about the correct, universally agreed, terminology for describing 17th-century objects today, not what they might have been called in the 17th century (though that can be mentioned, but I very much doubt it was "wood engraving") or the 19th century - which is when "wood engraving" meaning woodcut was an acceptable term. You have brought forward a number of unreliable sources, unreliable either in terms of age, or of lack of subject knowledge. You have some reliable sources, but won't follow them consistently, just leaving a mess. Your invented OR term "woodcut engraving", presumably an attempt at a compromise, is I think used by none of your sources, and will naturally confuse rather than help the reader. Its not a matter of opinion, or interpretation. As to "how do we refer to Foster" - easy - he was a printmaker, which I put in and you reverted. He was also a Blockcutter, on the assumption he cut his own blocks, which everybody seems to think. Johnbod (talk) 18:57, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Are not people who employ engravings printmakers also? If the term was "universally" agreed or recognized then there would not be so many sources that refer to Foster as an engraver, including some modern sources (e.g.Roark, 2003, pp. 29, 37, Rex, 2011, pp. 88, 90, and Woodward, 1967, multiple occurrences.) Btw, the term printmaker occurs three times in the article. In any case, I'm not about to change what many sources say when they are used in citations, and I'm not about to ignore the lot of them over some rigid interpretation when the term is used figuratively. The sources used are among the best there are for Foster, regardless of any opinion over a general term used. Again, the Wood engraving article also refers to "wood engraving" as "Functionally a variety of woodcut.." -- Gwillhickers (talk) 19:16, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Link needs fixing

@Gwillhickers:, what were you trying to do here as the double pipe is effectively circular? Neils51 (talk) 19:13, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for catching that. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 19:46, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

Centering

@Nikkimaria: — I tried using the newer markup for 'centering' two images in the Printing career section, but for whatever reason, the images would not display, so for now I'm using the <center> markup until someone can remedy the matter. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 19:27, 21 November 2022 (UTC)