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The work is a celebratory compendium that seeks to catalogue the sweeping achievements of the nineteenth century. It opens with a richly described illustration in which a personified figure of Industry stands amid allegorical goddesses of Music, Electricity, Literature, and Art, while symbols of navigation, railroads, machinery, and science surround her. From this visual preface the author, James P. Boyd, explains his ambition to present “original, entertaining and instructive historic and descriptive writings” that trace the material, intellectual, social and moral progress of a hundred years. The volume is organized into a series of themed essays, electricity, naval progress, astronomy, botany, women’s advancement, textile innovation, religious development, library growth, and many others, each contributed by a specialist whose credentials are listed alongside the subject.
The prose reflects the grand, expository style of late‑Victorian reference works, with a tone that is both reverent and didactic. It is densely packed with facts, illustrated with elaborate engravings, and written for readers who appreciate a thorough, scholarly survey of an era rather than a narrative story. Historians, engineers, and anyone fascinated by the cultural and technological transformations of the 1800s will find the book’s comprehensive scope and authoritative voices especially rewarding.
The opening · free to read
Measuring epochs, or eras, by spaces of a hundred years each, that which embraces the nineteenth century stands out in sublime and encouraging contrast with any that has preceded it. As the legatee of all prior centuries, it has enlarged and ennobled its bequest to an extent unparalleled in history; while it has at the same time, through a genius and energy peculiar to itself, created an original endowment for its own enjoyment and for the future richer by far than any heretofore recorded. Indeed, without permitting existing and pardonable pride to endanger rigid truth, it may be said that along many of the lines of invention and progress which have most intimately affected the life and civilization of the world, the nineteenth century has achieved triumphs and accomplished wonders equal, if not superior, to all other centuries combined.
Therefore, what more fitting time than at its close to pass in pleasing and instructive review the numerous material and intellectual achievements that have so distinguished it, and have contributed in so many and such marvelous ways to the great advance and genuine comfort of the human race! Or, what could prove a greater source of pride and profit than to compare its glorious works with those of the past, the better to understand and measure the actual steps and real extent of the progress of mankind! Or, what more delightful and inspiring than to realize that the sum of those wonderful activities, of which each reader is, or has been, a part, has gone to increase the grandeur of a world era whose rays will penetrate and brighten the coming centuries!
Amid so many and such strong reasons this volume finds excellent cause for its being. Its aims are to mirror a wonderful century from the vantage ground of its closing year; to faithfully trace the lines which mark its almost magical advance; to give it that high and true historic place whence its contrasts with the past can be best noted, and its light upon the future most directly thrown.
This task would be clearly beyond the power of a single mind. So rapid has progress been during some parts of the century, so amazing have been results along the lines of discovery and invention, so various have been the fields of action, that only those of special knowledge and training could be expected to do full justice to the many subjects to be treated.
Hence, the work has been planned so as to give it a value far beyond what could be imparted by a single mind. Each of the themes chosen to type the century’s grand march has been treated by an author of special fitness, and high up in his or her profession or calling, with a view to securing for readers the best thoughts and facts relating to the remarkable events of an hundred years. In this respect the volume is unique and original. Its authorship is not of one mind, but of a corps of minds, whose union assures what the occasion demands.
The scope, character, and value of the volume further appear in its very large number and practical feature of subjects selected to show the active forces, the upward and onward movements, and the grand results that have operated within, and triumphantly crowned, an era without parallel. These subjects embrace the sciences of the century in their numerous divisions and conquests; its arts and literature; industrial, commercial, and financial progress; land and sea prowess; educational, social, moral, and religious growth; in fact, every field of enterprise and achievement within the space of time covered by the work.
A volume of such variety of subject and great extent affords fine opportunity for illustration. The publishers have taken full advantage of this, and have beautified it in a manner which commends itself to every eye and taste. Rarely has a volume been so highly and elegantly embellished. Each subject is illuminated so as to increase the pleasure of reading and make an impression which will prove lasting.
As to its aim and scope, its number of specially qualified authors, its vigor and variety of style and thought, its historic comprehensiveness and exactness, its great wealth of illustration, its superb mechanism, its various other striking features, the volume may readily rank as one of the century’s triumphs, a wonder of industrious preparation, and acceptable to all. At any rate, no such volume has ever mirrored any previous century, and none will come to reflect the nineteenth century with truer line and color.
Not only is the work a rare and costly picture, filled in with inspiring details by master hands, but it is equally a monument, whose solid base, grand proportions, and elegant finish are in keeping with the spirit of the era it marks and the results it honors. Its every inscription is a glowing tribute to human achievement of whatever kind and wherever the field of action may lie, and therefore a happy means of conveying to twentieth century actors the story of a time whose glories they will find it hard to excel. May this picture and monument be viewed, studied, and admired by all, so that the momentous chapters which round the history of a closing century shall avail in shaping the beginnings of a succeeding one.
REAR-ADMIRAL GEORGE WALLACE MELVILLE, Chief of Bureau of Steam Engineering, Navy Department, Washington, D. C. THE CENTURY’S NAVAL PROGRESS.
SELDEN J. COFFIN, A. M., Professor of Astronomy, Lafayette College, Easton, Pa. ASTRONOMY DURING THE CENTURY.
THOMAS MEEHAN, Vice-President Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia. STORY OF PLANT AND FLOWER.
MARY ELIZABETH LEASE, First Woman President of Kansas State Board of Charities. PROGRESS OF WOMEN WITHIN THE CENTURY.
ROBERT P. HAINS, Principal Examiner of Textiles, United States Patent Office, Washington, D. C. THE CENTURY’S TEXTILE PROGRESS.
GEORGE EDWARD REED, S. T. D., LL. D., President of Dickinson College, Carlisle, Pa. THE CENTURY’S RELIGIOUS PROGRESS.
JAMES P. BOYD, A. M., L. B., GREAT GROWTH OF LIBRARIES.
WILLIAM MARTIN AIKEN, F. A. I. A., Former United States Supervising Architect, Treasury Department, Washington, D. C. PROGRESS OF THE CENTURY IN ARCHITECTURE.
HARVEY W. WILEY, M. D., PH. D., LL. D., Chief Chemist of Division of Chemistry, Agricultural Department, Washington, D. C. THE CENTURY’S PROGRESS IN CHEMISTRY.
RITER FITZGERALD, A. M., Dramatic Critic “City Item,” Philadelphia. THE CENTURY’S MUSIC AND DRAMA.
JAMES P. BOYD, A. M., L. B., THE CENTURY’S LITERATURE.
MORRIS JASTROW, JR., PH. D., Professor of Semitic Languages, University of Pennsylvania. THE RECORDS OF THE PAST.
MAJOR HENRY E. ALVORD, C. E., LL. D., Chief of Dairy Division, United States Department of Agriculture, Washington, D. C. PROGRESS IN DAIRY FARMING.
SARA Y. STEVENSON, Sc. D., Secretary of Department of Archæology and Paleontology, University of Pennsylvania. THE CENTURY’S MORAL PROGRESS.
CHARLES McINTIRE, A. M., M. D., Lecturer on Sanitary Science, Lafayette College, Easton, Pa. PROGRESS OF SANITARY SCIENCE.
LIEUTENANT-COLONEL ARTHUR L. WAGNER, Assistant Adjutant General United States Army. THE CENTURY’S ARMIES AND ARMS.
WALDO F. BROWN, Agricultural Editor “Cincinnati Gazette.” THE CENTURY’S PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURE.
WALTER LORING WEBB, C. E., Assistant Professor of Civil Engineering, University of Pennsylvania. PROGRESS IN CIVIL ENGINEERING.
D. E. SALMON, M. D., Chief of Bureau of Animal Industry, Agricultural Department, Washington, D. C. THE CENTURY’S PROGRESS IN THE ANIMAL WORLD.
MAJOR-GENERAL JOSEPH WHEELER, United States Army, and Member of Congress from Eighth Alabama District. LEADING WARS OF THE CENTURY.
GEORGE J. HAGAR, Editor of Appendix to Encyclopædia Britannica. THE CENTURY’S FAIRS AND EXPOSITIONS.
HON. BRADFORD RHODES, Editor of “Banker’s Magazine.” THE CENTURY’S PROGRESS IN COINAGE, CURRENCY, AND BANKING.
H. E. VAN DEMAN, Late Professor of Botany and Practical Horticulture, Kansas State Agricultural College. THE CENTURY’S PROGRESS IN FRUIT CULTURE.
EMORY R. JOHNSON, A. M., Assistant Professor of Transportation and Commerce, University of Pennsylvania. THE CENTURY’S COMMERCIAL PROGRESS.
FRANKLIN S. EDMONDS, A. M., Assistant Professor of Political Science, Central High School, Philadelphia. THE CENTURY’S ADVANCES IN EDUCATION.
THOMAS J. LINDSEY, Editorial Staff Philadelphia “Evening Bulletin.” “THE ART PRESERVATIVE.”
GEORGE A. PACKARD, Metallurgist and Mining Engineer. PROGRESS IN MINES AND MINING.
JOHN V. SEARS, Art Critic Philadelphia “Evening Telegraph.” ART PROGRESS OF THE CENTURY.
J. MADISON TAYLOR, M. D., AND JOHN H. GIBBON, M. D., Surgeons Out-Patients Departments of Pennsylvania and Children’s Hospitals. THE CENTURY’S ADVANCE IN SURGERY.
FRANK C. HAMMOND, M. D., Instructor in Gynæcology, Jefferson Medical College. PROGRESS OF MEDICINE.
E. E. RUSSELL TRATMAN, C. E., Assistant Editor of “Engineering News,” Chicago, Ill. EVOLUTION OF THE RAILROAD.
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