Acknowledgements

A task of this complexity could not be completed without the help of many curators and scholars generous with their time and valuable information.
The research has, of course, drawn heavily on resources and staff of the key North American archives. Curatorial assistance has been crucial both for accessing the collections and assisting me in securing the permissions to reproduce the images on the web. In this regard, I am especially grateful to Joan H. Sussler, Lewis Walpole Library, Yale University; Roberta Waddell and Margaret Glover, Print Department, New York Public Library; Harry Katz and Sara Duke, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress; Scott Wilcox, Gillian Forrester, and Martha Buck, Yale Center for British Art, Yale University; Rachel Howarth and Susan Halpert, Harry Elkins Widener Collection at the Houghton Library of the Harvard College Library; Annette Fern, Theatre Collection, Houghton Library of the Harvard College Library; Catherine Grosfils and Jane Mackley, John D. Rockefeller Library, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation; Heather Lemonedes, Julie Zeftel, and Eileen Sullivan, Metropolitan Museum; John Pemberton, Mariner’s Museum; Paul Gehl and John Powell, Newberry Library; Susan Danforth, John Carter Brown Library of Brown University; David Zeidberg and Cathy Cherbosque, Huntington Library; and print curators and staffs at the Boston Public Library, American Antiquarian Society, Library Company of Philadelphia, and the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto.

Beside this critical assistance from American curators, the British collections have been immensely valuable for comparative purposes and for filling out background for the development of the mezzotint droll. Guy Shaw, then curator of the Hon. Christopher Lennox-Boyd Collection was instrumental in introducing me to the scope and variety of the drolls in an early visit to Burford, Oxfordshire when I was tracking down a handful of nautical satires. On several subsequent visits, Guy Shaw shared his knowledge of printsellers, contemporary printsellers' catalogues, and their collection. He has always been helpful in pointing me toward others who could serve as resources.

Guy Shaw introduced me to Ellen D’Oench’s work. Our common debt to him was an immediate bond when I later met her, rather like joining a delightful conversation about drolls that had been going on for some time. I am grateful to her for reading a manuscript of the catalogue and for her unfailingly good advice.

I also thank the Hon. Christopher Lennox-Boyd for his hospitality in my several visits to his private collection and for his commitment to its accessibility.

In addition, Sheila O’Connell has been my guide to the British Museum collection, both to prints included by Stephens and George in the British Museum Catalogue and to mezzotints acquired since 1945. In addition, she offered significant insights into the print trade of the late 18th Century. David Alexander has also been also a valuable resource. The extent to which the catalogue sketches a borderline between the fancy picture and the droll owes a great deal to his observations on the drolls’ sources. And for putting me in touch with David Alexander, I am indebted to a classmate of his and old friend of mine, G.J. Barker-Benfield.

Beside the British collections noted above, I also thank print curators and staff at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, Victoria and Albert Museum, and the Guildhall Museum.

Daveena Tauber, currently completing a doctorate at Rutgers University, shared with me an Arthur Vining Davis faculty/student research grant from Lewis & Clark College, researching the collection at the Library of Congress and drafting descriptions for their mezzotint satires. In addition to that award, my work toward a catalogue has been supported by College faculty research grants. Mike McNamara, Information Technology, has offered on-going support and aid in developing this project and his guidance has been invaluable. I am also grateful to June Jones, Associate Provost, and Jim Kopf, Director of the Watzek Library, for their assistance at critical stages as the project took shape.

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