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[Henry Clay, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing front] – Vintage Wall Art

[Henry Clay, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing front], [between 1850 and 1852] — historic photograph
[Henry Clay, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing front], [between 1850 and 1852]. Historic photograph from the Daguerreotypes & Early Photography collection.

(Originally scanned by the Library of Congress. Each image is professionally and digitally cleaned of artifacts such as color bars and extra borders prior to printing.)

Description

A window into the past: [Henry Clay, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing front], preserved in this historic photograph. It comes from the collections of the Library of Congress, scanned from the original and carefully restored.

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[Henry Clay, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing front]

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Scratched on the back of this half-plate daguerreotype are the number 135 and the sitter's name, Henry Clay, and the plate was made in Mathew Brady's studio between 1850 and 1852. Clay, the Kentucky senator who died in 1852, was nearing the end of a long career and was tied to the Compromise of 1850 over slavery and the western territories. The head-and-shoulders pose, facing the camera, gives a direct view of him in his later years. The identification rests on an engraving by William G. Jackman, credited to Brady, that later appeared in Appleton's Cyclopedia.

Created / published[between 1850 and 1852]
Medium1 photograph : half plate daguerreotype.
GenrePortrait photographs 1850-1860.Daguerreotypes 1850-1860.
NotesScratched on back of plate: 135; Henry Clay. Identification from engraving by William G. Jackman with daguerrean credit to Brady, Reproduced in Appleton's Cyclopedia of American Biography, v. 1 (New York: 1887, opp. pg. 641). Facing the light / H. Pfister. Washington : Smithsonian Institution Press, 1978, p. 307. Transfer; U.S. War College; 1920; (DLC/PP-1920:46153). Forms part of: Daguerreotype collection (Library of Congress). Produced by Mathew Brady's studio.
SubjectsClay, Henry,--1777-1852.
SourceLibrary of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division
Original scan1,195 × 1,536 px · prints to 4 × 5 in at 300 dpi
Reference94_Henry_Clay_headandshoul_1850

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