Library of Congress Acquires One of the Earliest Known Drawings of Yosemite Valley

Long before Yosemite became one of the nation’s most famous national parks—or photographers like Ansel Adams turned its landscapes into iconic images—the valley first captured the public’s imagination through a simple drawing.

In 1855, artist Thomas Almond Ayres visited a remote Sierra Nevada valley and sketched what he saw: a massive waterfall plunging between towering granite walls. At the time, Yosemite was largely unknown to most Americans, and images like Ayres’ drawing helped reveal the landscape to the wider world.

Now, more than 170 years later, the Library of Congress has acquired that original sketch along with a rare lithograph created from the artwork the same year. Officials announced the acquisition on March 5, calling the pieces some of the earliest visual representations of Yosemite Valley.

The lithograph, titled “The Yo-Hamite Falls,” was published in October 1855 by California publisher James Mason Hutchings. During an era before photography became widespread, prints like this played a major role in shaping how Americans pictured the West.

The works also predate the famous Yosemite photographs taken by Carleton Watkins and the dramatic landscape paintings of Albert Bierstadt, both of which later helped elevate Yosemite’s reputation across the country.

According to a curator at the Library of Congress, Ayres and Hutchings reached the valley while traveling with Miwok guides along trails used to access seasonal Indigenous hunting and gathering areas. The drawing captures both the scale and quiet beauty of the landscape at a time when much of California was being transformed by Gold Rush mining.

The newly acquired pieces were funded through the Library’s James Madison Council as part of its “America 250: It’s Your Story” initiative and will eventually be made available online for the public and researchers.