ILLUSTRATED JOURNALISM.

Abstract

The career of the Anglo-American artist Matthew Somerville Morgan illuminates some of the connections linking developments in illustrated journalism in Britain and the United States during a period of explosive growth and technological transformation. Although popular demand for printed pictures is as old as print itself, most pictorial reproductions were produced from metal plate engravings which were not only costly but, being engraved in intaglio, could not be printed together with raised type. However the wooden block, engraved in relief, made it possible to print a page combining letterpress and illustration in a single operation, an essential precondition for mass-market pictorial journalism. As is well known, the first two journals to effectively cash in on this formula were Punch and the Illustrated London News, first appearing in 1841 and 1842 respectively. Imitators were quick to follow and the supply of wood engravers expanded rapidly to meet demand, as did that of illustrators to draw on the blocks. Matt Morgan had won a considerable name for himself as a commercial artist in London, when he decided to take his talents to the United States, where he was to become even better known as an unusually versatile popular artist and illustrator. Morgan was born into London’s artistic community in 1836. 1 His father was a minor actor and music teacher, his mother a minor actress