It's funny as not so long ago, the books to color were considered the exclusive field of children. How times have changed. If you are the kind of adult that takes place with a large box of Crayolas and Mandalas pages or Ryan Gosling contours, you owe a gratitude debt to the McLoughlin brothers and Kate Greenaway illustrator.
Their Painting book for little people Fleece on the stage around 1879 with fun engravings to flow like “The Owl's Advice”, “A Flower Fairy” and “Little Miss Pride”, each accompanied by nursery rhymes and stories. The abundance of crowds, pinafores and panties is a piece with the lasting Greenaway of the nursery, although manual adult dexterity seems almost compulsory given the tiny models and other details.
Seeing how there was no precedent, the publishers of the first coloring book in the world took place and filled the frontispiece so that those who attack the hundred other drawings know what to do. (Tip: Stay inside the lines and don't be too creative with the skin or hair color.)
Note also: the copy represented here has been carefully hand -colored by the previous owners, with a exuberant scribbles in pencil. See the full book and download it in various formats, on archive.org.
Note: a previous version of this article appeared on our site in 2016.
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