|
||
|
|
|
|
Rare advertising broadside for William Marshall's stereoviews and lectures on Yellowstone. Includes one of the earliest obtainable maps of Yellowstone.
William Isaac Marshall (1840-1906) was one of the earliest promoters of Yellowstone National Park. In the mid 1870s, Marshall purchased a large Yellowstone and Montana photo collection from Joshua Crissman and sold the pictures under his own copyright. Marshall arrived in Montana Territory in July, 1866 and resided in Virginia City through October, 1875. He joined the stampede to that town for gold, and the Hayden survey party met him there in 1871, where he was working on a mining claim.
Marshall stated that he visited Yellowstone with his family in 1873 and 1875, bragging that he took the first children ever (two of his own and one other of a co-traveler) through the park. From and early date, he sold Crissman stereoviews of Yellowstone. These views, which were titled simply "The National Park," reached at least to number 122 in his series. He advertised and sold these views to teachers, clergymen, and others at his lectures on Yellowstone and by mail as promoted through articles he wrote about the park for National Education Association Proceedings. Marshall advertised commercial tours of Yellowstone, and he did bring at least one such group into the Park.
It appears that Marshall made only four trips to the park: in 1873, 1875, 1881, and 1882. Marshall, important here not only for the Crissman photos he sold but also as one of Yellowstone's earliest tour guides, was later an educator in the east, and he was often referred to as "Professor" in various mentions of him. After 1875, he moved back to Fitchburg, Massachusetts, for his stereo views had the name of that place stamped on them with the copyright date of 1876, and his published articles gave that place as his residence. In 1887, he moved to Chicago where he became principal of the Gladstone School. He apparently remained interested in Yellowstone for the rest of his life, because as late as 1902, he visited the park and was given a permit to collect geological specimens. He sent a book manuscript in 1904 to Park Superintendent John Pitcher for comments, and that book was subsequently published. And he gave more than two hundred lectures to various educational associations on Yellowstone, Yosemite, and mining.
