Popular Photography in 19th-Century Cambridge

“There are no bad images; that’s just how your face looks at times.”
-Henri Cartier-Bresson

Today it’s hard to imagine life without photography in all media, but the arrival of popular photography in the mid-19th century created a remarkable transformation in how we understood the world … something akin the arrival of telephones. Photography increased our vision and hence our perception of the world around us. Without photography, we wouldn’t talk about “snap-shots” (coined by Sir John Herschel in 1860), “photo,” “close-up,” “pin-hole,” flash bulb,” or “shutterbug.”

THE START OF IT ALL

Several inventors made advances towards photography in the 19th century, but Louis Daguerre (1787-1851) clinched it with his invention of the daguerreotype in France in 1829.

The first daguerreotype operation in Cambridge seems to have been Mr. Clark Moore’s mobile studio. Imagine the astonishment at the Cambridge Chronicle‘s office on Main Street when one December day in 1849 the editor looked out his window and saw this “Daguerreotype Saloon” pass by!

Mr. Moore went on to establish his permanent studio at the corner of Main and Essex streets.

Fast forward a decade and photography had really seized the public’s attention:

A search of the local newspapers reveals that in the decade 1850-1859 the word “daguerreotype” appeared 91 times. The word “camera” only six times and the word “photographic” nine times. By 1890-1899, “daguerreotype” appeared only 12 times, “camera” 317 times, and “photographic” 696 times.

Articles appeared coaching would-be photographers on how to take the best portrait photograph:

Next appeared witty descriptions of surviving the application of ice tongs during the process:

PHOTOGRAPHY AS ART

This technology opened a new way of creating the sort of dignified portraits that had been traditionally captured by trained portrait painters. In this vein, many photographers referred to themselves as artists.

G.W. PACH’s studio was founded by him and his brothers in New York City. Wildly successful, they subsequently opened branches in Cambridge, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. They advertised heavily in Cambridge. Note the reference to his “Art Studio” in the advertisement:

In 1880, the Pach Bros. published a pamphlet “devoted to the interests of the photographic art …”, to “the building up of the glorious cause of art, and to convey such information as will lead to a greater interest in artistic efforts.”

COMPETITION FOR THE TRADITIONAL ARTISTS IN PORTRAIT PAINTING

“From today, painting is dead!”
(Attributed to French artist Paul Delaroche commenting on daguerreotypes).

Most probably portrait photography substantially ate into traditional painters’ business. “By 1859, Charles Baudelaire was denouncing photography as ‘the mortal enemy of art.’ ‘If photography is allowed to stand in for art in some of its functions,’ Baudelaire fumed, ‘it will soon supplant or corrupt it completely.’” (Baltimore Sun)

But it may also have given artists a boost. Now they could advertise their skill at painting portraits from photographs. And, since photography had captured the “realism” market, painters had more freedom to use looser styles, emphasizing qualities of light, and creating more atmospheric portraits.

The fine print: “we are connected with one of the best-known Photographic Establishments in Boston, and parties desiring portraits or Colored Work will be furnished with sitting free of expense.”

AND THEN CAME GEORGE EASTMAN
“You press the button – we do the rest.”

George Eastman launched the Kodak – the first successful roll-film camera – in 1888. “The camera was sold loaded with film, and both had to be sent back to the factory for processing. Over 13,000 cameras were sold in the first year. (http://www.alternativephotography.com/history-photographic-words/)

Other varieties of cameras soon hit the market:

Photographic equipment was frequently sold in hardware stores:

PHOTOGRAPHY CLUBS

The advent of Eastman’s Kodak camera advanced amateur photography substantially. Cambridge alone had seven different photographic clubs: The Old Cambridge Photographic Club (1892) was founded by Alice C. Allyn. Others included the YMCA Camera Club, Cambridge Camera Club (1888), Lechmere Camera Club (1896), Harvard Cambridge Club, the Tech. Camera Club, and Cambridge Heights Camera Club. Many of these clubs focused on landscape, or nature, photography.

Butterfield was known for his landscape photographs:

Many women also took up photography, including Alice M. Longfellow, a daughter of the poet, “whose pictures of nature are a cherished heritage of the whole American people. … Miss Longfellow’s landscape views are noted for delicacy of gradation, poetic feeling and beauty of sentiment.” (Cambridge Chronicle November 16, 1889). Others were Delia Stickney and Cornelia Horsford.

One post can’t do justice to the range of popular, nature, and scientific photography in Cambridge in the late 19th century. Many well-known names and institutions are missing from this account. For instance, George Kendall Warren, who photographed Harvard graduates; Augustus Story, who was the chief photographer on the 1882 scientific expedition to New Zealand to observe the Transit of Venus; and the Harvard Observatory collection.

BUT FOR AMATEURS….

Move over George Eastman…. Here comes Edwin Land!

Today’s post was written by CHC volunteer Kathleen Fox.

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SOURCES
Cambridge Public Library digital newspapers
Ancestry.com
Newspapers.com
Harvard University
Wikipedia
Wells, James A. A Short History of the Old Cambridge Photographic Club. Boston: Alfred Mudge & Son Inc. Printers, 1905.
Merry A. Forest American Photographs: The First Century (Washington, D.C.: National Museum of American Art with the Smithsonian Institution Press, 1996.)
http://www.alternativephotography.com/history-photographic-words/Nelson Atkins Museum of Art https://art.nelson-atkins.org/
https://artsandculture.google.com/. From the J. Paul Getty Museum
http://www.alternativephotography.com/history-photographic-words/
McNatt, Glenn. “Photography and Painting Influence Each Other.” Baltimore Sun, February 15, 1998.