Rare watercolor certificate of birth and baptism for John Wesley Dasham, Henry Young (1792-1861) Probably Aaronsburg, Centre County, Pennsylvania, circa 1852

Watercolor and ink on paper

Inscribed recto, ink: Certificate of Birth and Baptism / Mr. John Wesley Dasham, a Son of Mr. Jacob / Dasham and his wife Lydia, born a Royer, was/born December the 16th 1852. This child was born in Potter /Township, Centre County, State of Pennsylvania, and baptized / by the Revd. Rothrauf His Sponsors were, the Parents.

Sotheby Parke-Bernet, June 30-July 1, 1983, lot 370

American Radiance: The Ralph Esmerian Gift to the American Folk Art Museum, p. 217, fig. 187

Minor wrinkles; small water stain, extreme right. Tape hinged. Framed, frame not original. The piece is not lined or glued down. The color of the paper has darkened from the original paper color, but the condition is very sound.
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This birth certificate exemplifies the manner in which fraktur makers depicted human forms. Human figures naturally increased the appeal of any fraktur. A man and a woman depicted on a baptismal record probably represented the child's sponsors, as the Sussel-Washington Artist indicated by labeling their images (see cat. no. 206). The special relationship between sponsors and godchild extended from a moral responsibility for the child's welfare to the unwritten expectation that the sponsors would raise the child if the parents died, leave a bequest if they had no children of their own, and make gifts at key stages of life.

The couple on the Taufschein for Johannes Dottere by the unidentified artist known as the Northhampton County (or Bird-in-the-Hand) Artist are rather relaxed and illustrate the saying ''A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" -or, as here, "in the woods" -a bit of common sense but hardly a religious admonition. The Gilbert-type Taufschein for Isaac Wummer presents two clad and shod angels trumpeting, perhaps to announce little Isaac's birth. An assortment of floral decorations completes the drawing. Conrad Gilbert's angels tend to be similarly attired but do not suffer quite the severe trumpeter's lip as these.

John Zinck's stylishly dressed formal folk on the birth record for William Kulb are rather stiff, even as his flowers come closer to realism than did earlier artists' work. Either way, the human figure ties the child to the race of which he is a part.¹ The man and woman in Henry Young's certificate of birth and baptism for John Wesley Dasham are perhaps the sponsors but also in this case the child's parents. The man holds a bouquet of flowers to put into a vase on a stand. The lady wears an apron, once a part of every Pennsylvania German woman's attire but not present on every woman drawn by Young.² -F.S.W.

¹ John Zinck was identified by Donald A. Shelley: see Shelley, "The Fraktur-Writings or Illuminated Manuscripts of the Pennsylvania Germans," The Pennsylvania German Folklore Society 23 (1958/59): 132-33.
² Young used several distinct conventionalized formats in his certificates; the development is traced in E. Bryding Adams, "The Fraktur Artist Henry Young," Der Reggeboge (The Rainbow): Quarterly of the Pennsylvania German Society 22, no. 3-4 (fall 1977): 1-25.