Series I. Clippings and wood engravings

This series consists primarily of advertisements and images from Victorian-era publications. Dorsey cut the images out, pasted them onto notebook paper, and arranged them into three-ring binders by topic. The binders have been disbound and the material housed in acid-free folders.

The illustrations in the series cover a broad range of topics, from fashion (the largest single category) to fire-fighting equipment. Many of the topics relate to household and interior design, for example, cases and boxes, silver and cutlery, garden statuary, lighting, house design, etc. There are also a number of pictorial vignettes and genre scenes of children, courtship and romance, and outdoor recreation. Animals and plants are also well-represented.

Although most of the images arranged by subject are wood engravings, there is also a separate category of "wood engravings" at the end of the series, which was originally housed in three binders. Dorsey prepared a subject index for these binders (included in Box 11, Folder 1), which lists the following topics: artists, automobiles, balloons, bicycles, buildings, children, Christmas, circus, clocks and watches, design devices, drinking, entertainment, flowers, food and dining, general store, home furnishing, horses and wagons, hotels, houses, medicine, men, music, office furnishings, optical, patriotic and symbols, perfume, photography, rope, rural, ships, sports, stores, telegram, toys, trains, trolley, weather, the west, winter, and women.