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William H. Bartlett, The Caaterskill Falls from Below, engraving, c. 1830, 4 ½ x 7 in. Engraving by E. Benjamin. Published in American Scenery, or Land, Lake, and River Illustrations of Transatlantic Nature (1840), McKinney Library, Albany Institute of History and Art. View in Scrapbook

Bartlett painted views of popular tourist destinations in the United States. Engraved reproductions of his work were published in American Scenery, the most influential nineteenth-century volume of landscape views in the United States. In his idealized depiction of the plunging cataract, Bartlett drew from Cole's famous Falls of the Kaaterskill, also eliminating the observation platform. But he chose to exaggerate the height of the waterfall and replace the human figure with birds. Bartlett's images, made widely available through reproductions, helped to promote tourism in the Catskill area.  ¹