Joseph Goldsborough Bruff

1804–1889 (age 85)

Artist/Diarist

Biography

Joseph Goldsborough Bruff, born in 1804, combined a talent for drafting with an adventurous spirit, serving as a topographical engineer and chronicling journeys westward in precise detail.

His plentiful diaries and sketches became a rich record of expeditions, commerce, and daily life, and his devotion to documenting the American experience endures for historians today.