Medford Historical Society Papers, Volume 15.

[p. 15]

Edward Brooks was a contributor to the ‘North American Review.’ A unique pamphlet was written in 1847 by Abijah Baker—‘The Ark, Ships and Shipbuilding, with a Brie History of the Art,’ and a register of vessels built in Medford.

James Gilchrist Swan wrote ‘Life in the Northwest,’ in 1857, and later the ‘Amoor River.’ He was the author of many monographs on ethnology and made himself an authority, through observation, on the customs and languages of the Northwestern Indians. Much of his work was given to the Smithsonian Institution, and he filled many important public positions. Judge Swan presented the collection of Indian relics and curios to the Medford Public Library in 1880.

In 1856, a Medford lad of seventeen, Nathaniel Holmes Bishop, with forty dollars in his pocket, shipped before the mast and sailed to Buenos Ayres. From there he tramped, with a caravan of natives and aliens, over the Pampas, the Cordilleras, crossed the Andes through the snow, dangerously alone, landed in Chili, where he shipped again for the long voyage around Cape Horn, and reached home with five additional dollars in his pocket. The journal of this ‘One Thousand Mile Walk Across South America’ is of thrilling interest, and filled with geographical and ethnological data and descriptions of the flora and fauna of the countries he traversed. His interest in natural history was the incentive for making this unusual journey, and he brought home with him a rare collection. He also wrote the ‘Voyage of a Paper Canoe, from Quebec to New Orleans, via the Hudson River and Atlantic Waterways,’ and ‘Four Months in a Sneak Box,’ both records of personal experience.

In 1853 a volume of short stories, essays and poems by Louise J. Cutter were collected and published after her early death and named ‘Cypress Leaves.’

Elizabeth M. Hall compiled a book on ‘Practical American Cookery and Domestic Economy’ that would repay study, even in the changed conditions since 1856.