Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Nick Steagner's Tender 1900 Notebook/Sketchpad, Wayne County, PA wooden boy I don't have a strategic

I don't have a strategic bone in my body

black laquered paper mâché (such as that one finds antique snuff boxes made of) surface

along with some other cat related objects

"The perfect gift for that Special DO-NOTHING Friend /  that Useless Necessity a Husband / that Absolute Necessity a Wiife / Designed for Those Who are Going in Either Direction and a Reduction Gear for Big Wheels

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Nick Steagner's Tender 1900 Notebook/Sketchpad, Wayne County, PA wooden boy I don't have a strategicThis little notebook reveals itself as a very very tender one, quietly telling a story of a young man's artistic aspirations and what one presumes was his first trip from farm in Pennsylvania to New York City. I purchased it from a Pennsylvania based dealer who had several other sketchbooks by the same Nice Steagner (this one dated 1900) those others filled with drawing after drawing of cows, more cows, and more cows, occasionally horse or sheep, too.