Reindeer Polka (sheet music cover)

This sheet music cover, printed in lithography by Charles Currier (based on the image drawn by G.E. Lewis), shows a steamboat named "Reindeer" (on the paddlewheel and a banner at the stern) travelling on the Hudson River. As it heads from left to right through rough, white-capped waves, the smoke from the steamer's single smokestack and the banners at bow and stern (colored in red, blue with the white being unprinted paper) stream backwards towards the left of the image. On the far shore, it passes a cluster of buildings comprising Manhattanville, New York (now the West Harlem neighborhood of New York City). On the river in the background, there is another steamer (left) and several sailboats (center and right), while in the right foreground, four men are in a row boat. This cover lithograph accompanies two leaves (i.e. 4 unpaginated pages) of the polka's musical notation, plus a back cover.

Nathaniel Currier, whose New York-based lithography firm had begun in 1835, went on to produce thousands of hand-colored prints in various sizes that together create a vivid panorama of mid-to-late nineteenth century American life and its history. People eagerly acquired such lithographs featuring picturesque scenery, rural and city views, ships, railroads, portraits, hunting and fishing scenes, domestic life and numerous other subjects, as an inexpensive way to decorate their homes or business establishments. As the firm expanded, Nathaniel included his younger brother Charles Currier in the business. In 1857, James Merritt Ives (the firm's accountant since 1852 and Charles's brother-in-law) was made a business partner; subsequently renamed Currier & Ives, the successful firm continued until 1907.