THE NATIONAL STEREOSCOPIC ASSOCIATION VOL. 2, NO. 4 September-October 1975 By Gary N. Chamberlin the most significant influence on the scopic Company of the Langenheim early development of the stereoscopic Brothers in 1858. Five views were Of the patriarchs of local stereo- industry of the White Mountains. offered: Tip Top House, Summit of scopic photography in the White Franklin White, daguerrian artist, Mt. Washington; The Flume; Mount Mountain Region of New Hampshire, a first appears in the business directories Washington, from the Glen House; direct line of descent is traced to of Lancaster, N.H., in the mid 1850's Scene in the Notch; and Echo Lake. It Franklin White of Lancaster, New In this respect he was joining the ranks is not presently known if Franklin Hampshire. Stereoscopic photography of many other local photographers: White may have contributed views to did not suddenly appear here, nor was Sheppard, itinerant ambrotype artist the Langenheim list as did F.B. Gage one man responsible for its develop of Newbury, Vt.: O.C. Bolton, ambro- to the E. Anthony list. ment. Similarly other local variations type artist of Littleton, N.H., and F.B. The viewbooks of Franklin White on the development of stereophot- Gage, daguerrian artist of St. Johns- present one of the first comprehensive ography during the mid-nineteenth bury, Vermont. He thus began in the attempts to treat the White Mountain century reflect this trend, that this art commercial trade of portrait photog- Region as a whole. The culminating form was being introduced by degree raphy, but it was his work in landscape achievement of his summer of wander- to every hamlet and crossroad of their photography which set him apart from ings in 1858 with pencil, brush, and known world. One cannot fully appre- most of his comtemporaries. camera was an album of oval plain and ciate the later development of the The development of the tourist tinted views, entitled Photographic stereoscopic industry in Northern New industry in Northern New Hampshire views from Mt. Washington and Vicin- Hampshire to include the well known brought about a favorable climate for ity and the Franconia Range. Ilis first firms of Franklin Weller (1 867-1 876) both the artists and the audience of viewbook of twenty four views was and the Kilburn Brothers, Edward and stereoscopic views. The early unique, published in Lancaster and bears the. Benjamin (1 865-1 909)' without ident- local view gave way to a wider selec- copyright date Jan. 1859. He subse- ifying the agents of this development. tion, and finally an attempt to dis- quently published at least two addi- With the exception of the stereoscopic tribute views. Among the earliest tional viewbooks. White's Phota- artist F.B. Gage of St. Johnsbury, White Mountain attempts was the list graphic Views, for 1860, 2nd Series (Cont. on page 20) 'JIEmS LT LASCASTEX, N. K "Blacksmith Shop," from "Views in Lancaster, N.H." by Franklin White. (Richard Russack ~ollection).' "Stereo World" C'opyriehted 1975 bv N~tinnal~tercoxooicAssociation. By T. K. Treadwell stereoviews: it could be applied at any A rather unusual practice by ph* time, and indeed views are-found with tographers, dealers, and collectors has as many as three separate stampings. been the marking of stereoviews using Figure 3 shows one of the six known incised or raised, non-inked, letters or imprints of the London Stereoscopic designs. This technique is usually Company; on the other end of the called imprinting, blind-stamping, or same card (not shown) is an owner's embossing. While never common, it imprint. was considerably more so on very early views, being used by such pio- neers as Langenlleim and the London Following is an alphabetical listing Stereoscopic Company. The practice of the 91 imprints known to me; I am died out in the mid-1860s; was briefly obliged to Rick Russack for contribut- revived in the mid-1 870s; and persisted ing several early marks. Additions and in limited use into the present century. comments from readers would be Many of the large companies such as appreciated. Kilburn never used the technique at F. H. Aiken, Manchester, N.H. all; others such as Anthony, Bierstadt, (owner?) and Gutekunst employed it only for a A. M. Allen, Pottsville. Pa. short time. E. Anthony (Initials EA in circle) Although the results are super- A. B. (French) (A. Block?) ficially similar, three completely dif- L. R. (French) ferent methods were commonly used Marks could be incised. of course, J. W. R. (J. W. Black, Boston'?) to create a non-inked surface marking. .on any material softer than the die: i R. Sr D. (French ) The first was to mold the desired have examples of an owner's mark D. Barnom. Boston (two varieties) lettering into the cardboard mount stamped into a wooden box top, and Geo. L. D. Barton, Boston during its manufacture; the maker's even into the metal her of a case for Joseph L. Rates, Boston identification was usually a minor part glass views. Use of dies on such hard Beckel Bros., Lockport. N.Y. of an overall ornamental design, as on material would naturally soon blur the H. H. Bennett, Kilboum City, Wisc. the French tissue example shown in image and shorten the working life. Bierstadt Bros., New Bedford, Mass. Figure 1. These molded markings are The reasons for the early use of C. Bierstadt, Niagara Falls, N. Y. (in- usually the only maker's identification imprints are not at all clear. When itials in palette) found on this type of view. embossing replaced printing entirely, A. Boisseau (Canadian?) as with the French tissues, it probably W. E. Bowman. Ottawa, Ill. was a cost-saving device. In the great Cades (probably owner) majority of cases, however, imprints J. Caifle, Regensburg, Germany. were applied later, often in addition to C. R. Chisholm & Bros.. Montreal, printed material. This could only have Canada (probably dealer) been more expensive and troublesome. L. 0. Churchill, Montpelier, Vt. Permanency was also probably not a Colby (probably owner) reason; inks of that period were ade- Ch. D. (French) H. D. (French) Second, incised marks could be quately durable, as evidenced by the large quantities of printed cards which T. M. V. Doughty, Winstead, Vt. made by running the mount through a John G. Doughty, Winstead, Vt. printing press, but without ink and have survived. However, during the revival of im- J. 0. Durgan, Portland, Me. with the spacing between type and Edinburgh Stereoscopic Co., New mount set close so that the type printing about 1874, the mark was almost always put on one or both of York City pressed into the paper to give an J. Elliott (English) (Crown design) incised "non-printing". Figure 2 shows the photos, and the motivation is much more obvious. This revival fol- G. A. F. (French) the use of this technique on a rather W. A. Faze, Painesville, Ohio late card from the C. H. Graves Com- lowed closely on' the flood of illegal copy prints, and the imprinting was Ferd. Finsterlin, Munich, German. pany. certainly designed to identify (and French & Sawyer, Keene, N.H. hopefully deter) a pirate, without Godfray (English) greatly marring the original photo- J. Goodman (English) graph. It served this purpose well, C. H. Graves Co., Philadelphia (Uni- since when an imprinted photo is versal Photo Art Co.) viewed normally, in direct light, the F. Gutekunst, Philadelphia. imprint is inconspicuous. In the side- A. H. (French) lighting used in photocopying, how- Harwood (probably 1890s U.S.) ever, the imprint is shadowed and International View Co., Decatur, Ill. stands out accusingly in the copy. Isidor Hatschek, Vienna, Austria. Finally, one could press the name In the case of owners' imprints, one H. W. Hayt (owner) or design into the mount using a can only speculate that the motive was J. F. Jarvis, Washington, D. C. hand-held or table-mounted die- a combination of status symbol and J. H. Johnston, New York City stamping device. Die stamps can be insurance; much fancier than a written B. K. (French) bought today in any design desired, or rubber-stamped owner's name, and E. L. (French) and are often used to create a person- considerably harder to erase. Examples J. L. (French; J. Levy?) alized stationery. This type of imprint of personal imprints are shown in John Lawrence, Dublin, Ireland. is by far the most commonly found on Figure 4. (Cont. on page 14 ) Page Two Stereo Celebrities Military Leaders (Editor's note: Thi is the second of three eral McClellan. One other view worth articles on famous personalities who have mention by Gardner shows Major taken at his home in Biloxi, Missis- &eared on stereo views. Turn to page 5 for Allen and his staff, as he was known sippi, after the war. a special 12 view portfolio of Military during the Civil War, or as he is more The next conflict of war which was Leaders in stereo.) famously known now as Allen Pinker- to involve our country was the Span- By Gordon D. Hoffman ton, originator and founder of the ish-American War of 1898 and here famous Pinkerton Agency. too we find the stereo photographer Military leaders of the Civil War and Mathew Brady also took and pub- busy taking views of the leaders both other wars our country fought seems lished some fine Civil War portrait on the land and on the sea. Possibly to be next in line of popularity with views and these are today very scarce the most sought after views are of collectors after the Presidents.