Ride a Cock-Horse to Banbury Cross by Blanche Fisher Wright

Ride a Cock-Horse to Banbury Cross by Blanche Fisher Wright 

C.1916

Color Lithograph

This illustration, titled "Ride a Cock-Horse to Banbury Cross," is a full-page color plate from a historic edition of The Real Mother Goose, first published in 1916. The artwork was created by acclaimed American illustrator Blanche Fisher Wright to accompany the traditional English nursery rhyme of the same name. The scene depicts a fine lady with long blonde hair, wearing a feathered cap and a grey gown, riding a white horse adorned with bells. A crowd of onlookers, including a woman with a toddler and onlookers in the foreground, gather to see her rings on her fingers and bells on her toes. The piece exhibits Wright's iconic artistic style, using strong black outlines and clean, flat fields of color that define the golden era of early 20th-century children's book art.

The piece is situated within the "Golden Age" of children's book illustration, a period when visually dominant storytelling began to replace purely text-based books. Published by Rand McNally & Co., The Peter Patter Book was designed to bring the whimsical spirit of Mother Goose into a modern American context through Jackson's rhythmic, humorous verses. Blanche Fisher Wright is best known for her landmark 1916 work The Real Mother Goose, which established the "quintessential" visual identity for nursery rhymes that persists today. This specific piece is significant as it reflects the era's shift toward high-quality, visually appealing art intended to foster emotional intelligence and imagination in young children. Wright’s ability to capture both the "innocence and mischief" of the early 1900s has made her original 1918 illustrations highly collectible artifacts of American literary history.

Dimensions: H 11 ½” x 9 ½”W

Condition: Excellent Condition