Scientist of the Day - Joseph Wilson Lowry

Detail of Plate 2, Secondary strata, A Tabular View of Characteristic British Fossils, Stratigraphically Arranged [compiled and engraved by J. W. Lowry, drawn by C. R. Bone], 1853 (Linda Hall Library).

Joseph Wilson Lowry, an English engraver, was born Oct. 7, 1803.  His father, Wilson Lowry, was also an engraver, and trained his son in the art. A portrait of father Wilson survives; we cannot find one of his son and our subject, J.W.

Cloth cover with pasted title label, A Tabular View of Characteristic British Fossils, Stratigraphically Arranged [compiled and engraved by J. W. Lowry, drawn by C. R. Bone], 1853 (Linda Hall Library).

We have featured many scientific artists in this series, but not too many engravers, except for the Basire family associated with the Royal Society of London (see our posts on Basire I, Basire II and Basire III).  But Joseph Lowry stands out because he has an actual book to his credit, and it is a significant book: A Tabular View of Characteristic British Fossils, Sratigraphically Arranged  (1853).  It consists of four folding plates, mounted on linen, bound in a cloth cover without title page – indeed, without any letterpress at all, except for the printed paper label on the cover with the title (second image).  All of the text on the plates is engraved, by Lowry, whose name appears only on the last plate.  I have examined three copies of the work, and all lack a title page, are attributed to Lowry, and are catalogued under his name – possibly because his name on the last plate is preceded by “compiled and engraved by” (seventh image).  His name was not printed on the paper label; in our copy, it is written in, in pencil.  I am sure there is some other reason for authorial attribution to Lowry – I just haven’t found it yet.

The entire unfolded Plate 3, Mesozoic strata, A Tabular View of Characteristic British Fossils, Stratigraphically Arranged [compiled and engraved by J. W. Lowry, drawn by C. R. Bone], 1853 (Linda Hall Library).

Caveats aside, A Tabular View is a significant work, for it provided geologists with their first real stratigraphic column for England, showing the rocks and their characteristic fossils for Paleozoic (Primary), Mesozoic (Secondary), and Cenozoic (Tertiary) rocks.  It had been only 37 years since William Smith first suggested that each rock layer has its characteristic fossils; now Lowry provides a complete table for all the rocks of England.  If you removed the plates from their binding and stacked them in a column, with Plate 1 at the top and Plate 4 at the bottom, you would have a complete geological column with index fossils that you could mount on your wall, as I am sure some purchasers did.

Detail of Plate 3, showing an ichthyosaur and a plesiosaur, and a single Megalosaurus tooth at top left, A Tabular View of Characteristic British Fossils, Stratigraphically Arranged [compiled and engraved by J. W. Lowry, drawn by C. R. Bone], 1853 (Linda Hall Library).

Most of the fossils shown are marine – trilobites, brachiopods, ammonites, bivalves – which is probably appropriate, since most fossils are marine, especially in the Paleozoic era.  There are a few quadruped fossils to be seen – an Irish elk and a mastodon on Plate 1 (sixth image), and a plesiosaur and an ichthyosaur on Plate 3 (third and fourth images).  Interestingly, there is only one dinosaur fossil to be seen – one would expect to see a Megalosaurus jaw on Plate 3, in the Stonesfield slate, where William Buckland found it and pictured it in 1824, or some Iguanodon teeth in the fossils of the Weald on Plate 2.  Instead, we get just a single Megalosaurus tooth, which you can see just above the ichthyosaur in our fourth image.  Had the reconstructions of both dinosaurs by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins been unveiled yet – the public would not see them until 1854 – I suspect Lowry might have included them.  Or perhaps he was just not a dinosaur kind of guy

Left half of Plate 4, Primary or Paleozoic strata, with the evolution of fish dramatically depicted before there even was such a theory, A Tabular View of Characteristic British Fossils, Stratigraphically Arranged [compiled and engraved by J. W. Lowry, drawn by C. R. Bone], 1853 (Linda Hall Library).

Another mysterious aspect of this mystery book is why the artist gets no credit at all.  Plate 4 contains the inscription, at bottom left, "Drawn by C.R. Bone."  Charles Richard Bone was a respectable artist, and one can find several of his paintings in the V&A in London.  But his name does not appear in our library’s catalog record for the book, or in any other record I could find. Maybe Bone thought providing line drawings of fossils for an engraver was beneath his station, and he did his best to keep his name off the record.

Left half of Plate 1, Tertiary or Cenozoic strata, with a mastodon and an Irish elk at the top, A Tabular View of Characteristic British Fossils, Stratigraphically Arranged [compiled and engraved by J. W. Lowry, drawn by C. R. Bone], 1853 (Linda Hall Library).

Perhaps the best feature of Lowry’s Tabular View is the pleasure it provides the reader upon first opening.  It is a thin modest quarto, and its pasted label promises little. But when you open the cover and see a folded-up plate, and you unfold it to the right, and then do so again, and yet again, the linen backing providing a hefty feel to the expanding panorama of fossils, and then notice the hand-colored geological section on the left, well, it is a very satisfying experience.  Especially when you get to do it three more times.

Detail of Plate 4, bottom right, where it says: “Compiled & Engraved by J.W. Lowry,” A Tabular View of Characteristic British Fossils, Stratigraphically Arranged [compiled and engraved by J. W. Lowry, drawn by C. R. Bone], 1853 (Linda Hall Library).

We have another geological book in our collections with engravings by Lowry: Illustrations of the Geology of Yorkshire (1835-36), by John Phillips.   I arranged for that book to be scanned for this post, but we really don’t have any space left to discuss it, so we will save it for another occasion, perhaps for Phillips’ birthday (which might be tricky, since he was born on Christmas Day).  Whatever; we will find an occasion.

William B. Ashworth, Jr., Consultant for the History of Science, Linda Hall Library and Associate Professor emeritus, Department of History, University of Missouri-Kansas City. Comments or corrections are welcome; please direct to ashworthw@umkc.edu.