The next two images come from the Bettmann collection and are illustrations involving Little Red Riding Hood.
A reader has done some preliminary research (see comment below) and has followed up with additional details. The story is written by Maria A. Hoyer and published by Ernest Nister. The first image of the wolf approaching Red Riding Hood was illustrated by Ada Dennis. Finding the names and dates for illustrators in Nister publications is difficult as neither of these details were considered important and are rarely mentioned. During the over forty year existence of the publishing company, dozens of illustrators were contracted and were required to draw in a particular style making it hard to distinguish between them. On rare occasions, signatures or initials may be present. [160227]
Ada Dennis – Illustration of Wolf Approaching Little Red Riding Hood (c 1890)
According to the caption, the following image came from a slide taken of a lithograph.
(Artist Unknown) – Illustration of Little Red Riding Hood (c1890)
From the Bettmann Archive
Have done some further searching and found that the date and author are correct. The illustrator is still unknown and will take a lot more searching, mainly in books, to find. It requires more searching as Ernest Lister’s publishings business was set up from 1888-1917. During this time period it produced postcards, calendars and over 500 different book titles, therefore contracted dozens of different illustrators. Not all these books listed the illustrators name and worse when editing the images the signature would either be cropped out during editing or deleted during the colourization process. Worldcat and the British Libraries catalogue do not list the illustrator’s name. Out of the list of known illustrators I have read none have the initials A.D. In the original uncropped version of the first image the illustrators signature is A.D. so if there is a postcard or antique children’s book collector who knows this signature please mention it here.
The two pictures above are from the book Little Red Riding Hood published by Ernest Nister here is the best biography you will get
https://www.library.unt.edu/rarebooks/exhibits/popup2/nister.htm
the entire book has been digitised by the University of Florida, as part of the Baldwin Library of Historical Children’s Literature, and can be viewed at this address
http://ufdc.ufl.edu/UF00080495/00001/1x
Now for the complications. As this was a rushed reply, I recognised the illustration instantly, and have few reference books in my personal library I cannot give a more detailed description quickly. Don’t know the date of publication who the author or illustrator is. Additionally the age of the book is pre 1900 so information is scare and confused some references state E. Nister as publisher, illustrator and author. It is hugely unlikely that he is all three due to the large output of books in a time when this was still a complicated process. It may take a week (or month?) to find more info so in the mean time type Ernest Nister into image search engine and look at all the images he is entirely relevant to the blog.
I am loving this. Thanks for coming forward. I will dig into this in more detail when time allows. -Ron