Snapshots of the Past

[Washington Irving, half-length portrait, three-quarters to the left] – Antique Photo Print

[Washington Irving, half-length portrait, three-quarters to the left], [between 1855 and 1860] — historic photograph
[Washington Irving, half-length portrait, three-quarters to the left], [between 1855 and 1860]. 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: [Washington Irving, half-length portrait, three-quarters to the left], preserved in this historic photograph. An authentic image from the Library of Congress, it carries the weight of the real historical record.

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[Washington Irving, half-length portrait, three-quarters to the left]

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Few American writers of the early nineteenth century were photographed as often as Washington Irving, the author of "Rip Van Winkle" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." This half-length daguerreotype is a copy of an earlier image by John Plumbe, and the record notes that the copy reverses the original. Mathew Brady's studio produced it in the years just before Irving's death in 1859, when he was in his seventies and one of the best-known literary figures in the country. The gold toning and the three-quarter pose show the careful, formal style of studio portraiture from that period.

Created / published[between 1855 and 1860]
Medium1 photograph : half plate daguerreotype, gold toned.
GenrePortrait photographs 1850-1860.Daguerreotypes 1850-1860.
NotesHallmark: Rinhart 20. Scratched on back of plate: 47. Copy daguerreotype of original by John Plumbe in reverse. Facing the light / H. Pfister. Washington : Smithsonian Institution Press, 1978, p. 329. Transfer; U.S. War College; 1920; (DLC/PP-1920:46153). Forms part of: Daguerreotype collection (Library of Congress). Produced by Mathew Brady's studio.
SubjectsIrving, Washington,--1783-1859.
SourceLibrary of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division
Original scan1,159 × 1,536 px · prints to 4 × 5 in at 300 dpi
Reference713_Washington_Irving_halfl_1855

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