Background
Henry Chapman Mercer was born on June 24, 1856, at Doylestown, Pennsylvania. He was the son of William Robert and Mary Rebecca (Chapman) Mercer.
(Book by Mercer, Henry Chapman)
Book by Mercer, Henry Chapman
https://www.amazon.com/Ancient-Carpenters-Tools-Lumbermens-Eighteenth/dp/0818008180?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=0818008180
(The Lenape stone. Or, The Indian and the mammoth (1885). ...)
The Lenape stone. Or, The Indian and the mammoth (1885). This book, "The Lenape stone Or, The Indian and the mammoth", by Henry Chapman Mercer, is a replication of a book originally published before 1885. It has been restored by human beings, page by page, so that you may enjoy it in a form as close to the original as possible.
https://www.amazon.com/Lenape-Stone-Indian-Mammoth/dp/551848576X?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=551848576X
( This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923....)
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ++++ The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to ensure edition identification: ++++ The Bible In Iron: Or, The Pictured Stoves And Stove Plates Of The Pennsylvania Germans ; With Notes On Colonial Fire-backs In The United States, The Ten-plate Stove, Franklin's Fireplace And The Tile Stoves Of The Moravians In Pennsylvania And North Carolina, Together With A List Of Colonial ... Henry Chapman Mercer Bucks County Historical Society, 1914 Art; Subjects & Themes; Religious; Art / Subjects & Themes / Religious; Christian art and symbolism; Pennsylvania Dutch; Stove plates; Stove-plates; Stoves
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(This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)
This book was originally published prior to 1923, and represents a reproduction of an important historical work, maintaining the same format as the original work. While some publishers have opted to apply OCR (optical character recognition) technology to the process, we believe this leads to sub-optimal results (frequent typographical errors, strange characters and confusing formatting) and does not adequately preserve the historical character of the original artifact. We believe this work is culturally important in its original archival form. While we strive to adequately clean and digitally enhance the original work, there are occasionally instances where imperfections such as blurred or missing pages, poor pictures or errant marks may have been introduced due to either the quality of the original work or the scanning process itself. Despite these occasional imperfections, we have brought it back into print as part of our ongoing global book preservation commitment, providing customers with access to the best possible historical reprints. We appreciate your understanding of these occasional imperfections, and sincerely hope you enjoy seeing the book in a format as close as possible to that intended by the original publisher.
https://www.amazon.com/decorated-stove-plates-Pennsylvania-Germans/dp/B009UCF68K?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B009UCF68K
(Towards the end of his life, the eccentric archaeologist,...)
Towards the end of his life, the eccentric archaeologist, historian, architect, and collector Henry Chapman Mercer (1856-1930) channeled his antiquarian interests and his love of Gothic literature into November Night Tales (1928), a volume of highly imaginative weird tales in the mode of M.R. James. In "Castle Valley," unexpected consequences ensue when an artist gazes into an old crystal and sees visions of a Gothic castle. In "The Blackbirds," a flock of vultures may portend an ominous fate for a young man who has been warned that calamity will befall him on his birthday. "The Dolls' Castle" is a sinister place with a dark past that lays supernatural snares to catch unwary children. And in "The Wolf Book," a scholar visits a Transylvanian monastery where he discovers a mysterious manuscript that may be connected with a legendary werewolf. This first-ever republication of Mercer's tales includes all six stories from the scarce first edition, plus an additional rare story, "The Well of Monte Corbo," discovered among Mercer's papers after his death, and a new introduction by Cory M. Amsler of the Mercer Museum.
https://www.amazon.com/November-Night-Tales-Chapman-Mercer/dp/1943910049?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=1943910049
(Excerpt from Cave Hunting in Yucatan: A Lecture Delivered...)
Excerpt from Cave Hunting in Yucatan: A Lecture Delivered Before the Society of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, on December 10, 1896 But why search caves? Why go under ground? Why leave the daylight and all the beauty and wonder of the ruins to delve in damp, dark holes, where at most we proposed to find a few broken pieces of pottery, a few fragments of bone or chips of flint upon which the visitor at a museum might scarcely bestow a glance. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
https://www.amazon.com/Cave-Hunting-Yucatan-Massachusetts-Technology/dp/1334314179?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=1334314179
(In 1908, Henry Mercer wrote and published at his own expe...)
In 1908, Henry Mercer wrote and published at his own expense this guidebook to the various tiles and mosaics in the Pennsylvania Capitol so that visitors could read and appreciate the work as they strolled through the corridors and the great rotunda. Each mosaic had a significant story to tell and Mercer thought the story of the tiles and his own artistic intentions had to be communicated. Unavailable for many years, this newly reprinted guidebook is a useful tool in understanding the history of the Keystone State, as well as a record of this very important architectural masterpiece.
https://www.amazon.com/Guide-Tiled-Pavement-Pennsylvania-Capitol/dp/0964304848?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=0964304848
inventor antiquarian archeologist
Henry Chapman Mercer was born on June 24, 1856, at Doylestown, Pennsylvania. He was the son of William Robert and Mary Rebecca (Chapman) Mercer.
Mercer attended the Tennent School near Hartsville, Pennsylvania, and Harvard College, receiving the degree of A. B. in 1879.
Mercer read law in Philadelphia and was admitted to the bar in 1881, but his rapidly developing enthusiasm for archeology outweighed his interest in law, and after a few years he gave up the legal profession. As early as 1885 he published a monograph on The Lenape Stone, in recognition of which Spain later conferred a decoration upon him. He was an honorary member of the United States Archeological Commission at Madrid in 1893 and that same year became editor for anthropology in the American Naturalist. In 1894 he was made curator of American and prehistoric archeology for the University of Pennsylvania and filled that position until 1897. During this time he explored many caves and Indian mounds in the United States and Mexico. In the caves he identified the remains of several extinct animals, some of them hitherto unknown, including the prehistoric tapir, mylodon, peccary, and sloth. He explored the caves and ruins of Yucatan, fixing a geological date for the latter, and published his Hill Caves of Yucatan in 1896. He studied aboriginal remains in the Delaware, Ohio, and Tennessee valleys, discovering Indian stone-blade quarries and workshops along the Delaware, and giving much time to a study of technical comparison of these stone blades with the supposed geologically ancient human implements found in America and with those of the Pleistocene Age in Europe, particularly around Abbeville and in the Dordogne Valley, France, and in Spain and Belgium, where he did much work in drift gravels and flint quarries. His study of human remains in the American river valleys aided in tracing the lines of early migrations. His Researches upon the Antiquity of Man in the Delaware Valley and the Eastern United States appeared in 1897. The possession of ample private means enabled Mercer to drop his curatorship and editorial connection with the American Naturalist in 1897 and pursue his favorite studies at will. From that time until his death he made his headquarters at Doylestown, his birthplace. He was a fellow or member of a number of learned societies.
Mercer had been one of the founders of the Bucks County Historical Society at Doylestown in 1880, and it was with that society that he began depositing his growing collection of utensils and implements illustrating the colonial history of the United States. He published a monograph on the subject entitled Tools of the Nation Maker in 1897, and that name came in time to be applied to the collection itself. He was president of the society from 1911 until his death. In 1916 he built and endowed with his own funds a large concrete building to serve as museum for the collection and as a home for the society. Here, each in its own compartment, are complete sets of tools of varied metal, wood, clay, and textile working industries, as carried on by American pioneers, and other unusual yet kindred exhibits, as for example, an original Conestoga wagon, a "Democrat" wagon and a Norse gristmill, brought from a North Carolina mountain glen, but of an ancient type found in the northern Scottish isles and Scandinavia. Here also is a collection of the remarkable stove plates of the Pennsylvania Germans, regarding which Mercer wrote his monograph, The Bible in Iron, in 1914. He likewise studied the other artistic remains of the early German settlers, developing their processes of making and decorating pottery, until he finally invented in 1899 a new method of making mural decorative tiles, and in 1902 a new process for mosaics. He established a factory for the production of these tiles and designed many of them himself, taking his subjects from the Bible, history, literature, and mythology. In 1904 he invented a process for printing large designs in color on fabrics and paper, and was awarded a grand prize on it at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis that year. He made a number of other excursions in pursuit of his researches, meanwhile writing numerous articles on scientific and antiquarian subjects, and for several years prior to his death men under his guidance were employed in various parts of the world, such as China, southern Europe, and the near East, mostly in search of ancient implements, from which he was tracing the descent of modern tools.
(Excerpt from Cave Hunting in Yucatan: A Lecture Delivered...)
(Towards the end of his life, the eccentric archaeologist,...)
(In 1908, Henry Mercer wrote and published at his own expe...)
(This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)
( This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923....)
(Book by Mercer, Henry Chapman)
(The Lenape stone. Or, The Indian and the mammoth (1885). ...)
Mercer had made an intensive study of old houses and was often able to determine the age of a building by examining the door hardware, nails, screws, lath, and shaping of timbers. During the years 1906-08 he erected his own residence, "Fonthill, " a unique monolithic structure of sixty-six rooms near Doylestown, portions of it embellished with his own tiles, other rooms illustrating American colonial interiors. This, by his will, was endowed and bequeathed to the public as a museum, the ground around it to be an arboretum and bird sanctuary. He also left $100, 000 to finance an expedition to the Far East to collect tools and utensils used in the daily life of those countries.
Mercer was never married.
