Romeyn B. Hough: The Woodbook - Clippings

"This unusual sample book was the lifetime work of Romeyn B. Hough, whose devotion to the study of American trees resulted in the production of this monumental publication and his best known work, Handbook of Trees of the Northern States of Canada.
In the field of American dendrology, this later work became the standard reference, but the lavishly-produced American Woods provided a much larger and more unique record of American wood types. The age of these specimens gives them great importance from an ecological standpoint, but the work also has interest to students of American furniture and woodcrafts. Of equal significance is the fact that it would not be possible to reproduce the same range of woods today.

Hough explained the unique nature of his work: it is "illustrated by actual specimens, and being in this way an exhibition of nature itself it possesses a peculiar and great interest never found in a press-printed book. The specimens are about 2 x 5 inches in size, and sufficiently thin to admit of examination in transmitted light ... Looked at in reflected light they appear as in the board or log ... These specimens are mounted in durable frame-like bristol-board pages, with black waterproofed surfaces ... and each bears printed in gold-bronze the technical name of the species and its English, German, French and Spanish names ... The woods used for the specimens are personally collected by the author ... and are sectioned and prepared by a process of his own evidence."
Christie's catalogue, New York, October 2003, United States