Caught Napping

Thomas Worth, among America’s prolific nineteenth-century illustrators, excelled at drawing trotting horses and comic subjects, many of which were made into lithographs published by Currier & Ives. In this humorous print, a plump man is fast asleep as he sits against a tree trunk; his dog. curled up between his spread legs, also naps. The hunter's rifle is propped against the left side of the tree. At right, a fox creeps towards the pile of dead game birds in the middleground. .










Nathaniel Currier (1813–1888), who established a successful New York-based lithography firm in 1835, produced thousands of hand-colored prints in various sizes that together create a vivid panorama of mid-to-late nineteenth century America. In 1857, James Merritt Ives (1824–1895), the accounting-savvy brother-in-law of Nathaniel's brother Charles, was made a business partner. People eagerly acquired Currier & Ives lithographs, such as those featuring spectacular American landscapes, rural and city views, hunting and fishing scenes, domestic life and numerous other subjects, as an inexpensive way to decorate their homes or business establishments.