Peytona & Fashion

Name of the Currier & Ives print copy hanging over Almanzo Wilder’s bed at Rocky Ridge.

Currier and Ives was a successful American printmaking firm headed by Nathaniel Currier (1813–1888) and James Merritt Ives (1824–1895).

     

Peytona and Fashion is the title of the Currier & Ives print that’s framed and hangs over the head of Almanzo Wilder’s bed at Rocky Ridge Farm. The print shows the two horses competing in an 1845 race; Fashion was considered the best racemare of her generation or any that came before her.

Four other framed C&I prints are displayed on the wall beside his bed: The Road: Winter; Trotting Cracks at the Forge; A Midnight Race on the Mississippi; and The Lightning Express Train.

The Wilder pictures are calendar pages, probably from a freebie sent to them by the Traveler’s Insurance Agency in the 1930s. If you’re lucky, you can still find these old calendars for sale online for under $100.

     

Peytona & Fashion