Dated Images

This charming portrait shows a vignette image of a little girl. I guessed her age to be about seven — but found from her census listing that she must have been nine or ten years old, depending when in the year 1890 the photograph was taken. We know it was 1890 because the photographer conveniently put the year on his imprint.

I expected to find Lizzie listed as Elizabeth in the census, but no, she is listed just as on the card, Lizzie G Dalton, born in Missouri December 1880, daughter of William H Dalton (born April 1846 in Missouri) and Sarah Walton (born October 1845 in Tennessee).

The photographer is listed as Paul, in Springfield Missouri. That would be John P Paul (born about 1850 in Ohio), who had a studio at 306 Boonville in Springfield Missouri in 1890. John’s wife was Eliza, and they had one daughter, Mary E born ca 1874. John had a George W Paul working with him in his Springfield studio, but the relationship between the two has not been identified.

Before P T Barnum founded his famous circus, he had a museum of curiosities called Barnum’s American Museum in New York City. Among the attractions were a variety of unusual people such as albinos, bearded ladies, Siamese twins and small people (the term ‘midget’ is said to have been coined the same year as this photo — 1865, and was popularized by Barnum). Here we have the other end of the scale from little people — Noah Orr (1836-1882), given the honorary title of Colonel because, well, it just seemed fitting for such a big man.

We do not know exactly when this picture was taken, nor when it was printed, but we have the exact day it was sold — thanks to the tax stamp on the reverse. For a two years photographers were required to add stamps to their photos, from 1 Aug 1864 to 1 Aug 1866. The tax was established to help support the Union during the Civil War, but like many taxes it lingered beyond the war itself — this photo was sold November 24th 1865, seven months after the war ended. The photo was printed by E & H T Anthony, who may have taken the original photo, or may have purchased the negative from the original, unidentified, photographer.

The title for this image is printed on the front:

Col Noah Orr, The American Giant, Height 8 ft, 3 in, weight weight 550 lbs, age 22 years, at Barnum’s Museum.

If Orr was born in 1836, he would have been 22 in 1858, but this photo is probably later than that. The historical marker at the house where he died gives his height as 7 ft 8 inches, and I would not be surprised if the weight was not exaggerated a bit too. That’s show business.

From the very early years of photography into the 1950s, a small percentage of photographers made their living going around the country offering to photograph people in their homes. In effect, that translated to in front of their home, where the light was better. Sometimes they brought props that enticed parents to have their children photographed — on a pony, in a goat cart, etc.

In this photograph, the photographers apparently have a studio (at 820 Westminster street, Providence, Rhode Island), but they bill themselves right on their imprint as Prezeau & Tougas, home photographers. Conveniently for us, they also include the year in their imprint, 1903 in this case.

This images shows a little girl of seven or eight years, seated in a rocking chair, holding a baby in a very long christening gown — probably her little brother. It is interesting to note that even at her young age, the girl wears the high stiff collar that was currently in fashion for ladies of that time. Her dress has a fashionable yoke and embroidered trim.

The photographer draped a plain piece of canvas for background, and placed her chair next to a sparse and uninteresting potted plant. The white gown is washed out entirely in this too-contrasty image. If this is as good as they could do, I doubt these photographers stayed in business for long.

This 1873 image of a blue-eyed young gentleman is just one of several I have from the early 1870s that have the double-gilt border line which most people think indicates an 1860s image. True, the vast majority of pictures with this type of card-stock date from that decade, but not all of them — some hold-outs (or were they just slow businesses with leftover stock?) continued to use these in the early 1870s. The tie style is more typical of the 1870s, and the size of the vignette definitely places this in the late 1860s to early 1870s as well. Oh yes, and for you eBay sellers: the Civil War was April 1861 to April 1865 — not all 1860s (let alone the many 1870s, 1880s images described as ‘Civil War Era’) date from the Civil War. And those tax stamps? They were required August 1864 through August 1866 — so many authentic ones are actually post-Civil War, and some dealers have stuck old stamps on images as late as the 1890s to trick uninformed purchasers.

This photograph shows four children, probably siblings, carefully posed by the photographer on and around a couple wooden chairs — the younger boy kneeling on a kitchen chair, and the youngest girl seated in a high-chair. Despite the photographer’s best efforts, the expressions on the children are of suspicion and confusion. The older girl has one hand draped around the forearm of the younger boy, while the older boy holds one of the little girls hands — both quite awkwardly. The children neither understand nor approve of these arrangements, but Momma is probably off to one side, urging them to behave, so they try their best.

I don’t know who the photographer was, or exactly where this was taken, but I have noted that it was taken in December of 1851. It is a fine daguerreotype from just a dozen years after the introduction of photography to the public, so there was still a lot of experimenting going on to find pleasing poses. This photographer didn’t bother with any props beyond the chairs needed to raise the younger children to the heights of their standing siblings. This image provides a good view of children’s clothing from the early 1850s.