"American Album" contains over 200 photos of every aspect of life in America from the late 19th Century to the early 20th Century. The selection ranges from staged portraits to shipyards to bustling cities to small towns and, finally, to Americans at work and play. These images will haunt you as you look into the face of a vanished America, but still see your own reflection looking back at you.

"Picturesque America" is a collection of almost 50 wood and steel engravings that was originally issued in 1874 under the auspices of William Cullen Bryant. This collection, issued in 1974, by Oliver Jensen of American Heritage Magazine is essentially a second look at this late nineteenth century self-portrait through more modern eyes.

As Oliver Jensen states in his preface, these pictures are an idealized view of our country, and are not to be taken as representative. The engravings are by both well-known and obscure artists, and all are beautifully done. Here are pictures of various cities, rivers, mountains, and lakes from the Gilded Age, but without any of that period's cynicism. Even the cities seem to take on a pastoral quality that is both striking and impossibly sentimental. If you want to see how artists viewed the idealistic and proud hopes of late nineteenth century America, then I recommend this book. If you want to see photographs of the late nineteenth century, then I recommend "American Album" and "America's Yesterdays," both by Oliver Jensen or Michael Lesy's "Dreamland" .