Friendship album compiled 1833-1856 by Philadelphia, middle-class, African American social activist Amy Matilda Cassey (1808-1856). Cassey was a member of the Philadelphia Female Antislavery Society, founder of the African American coeducation literary and scientific society the Gilbert Lyceum, and active in the temperance movement. Volume contains entries by men and women, most active in the anti-slavery movement, of original and transcribed poems, prose, and essays, and watercolors and pencil sketches. Topics range from abolitionism and slavery, to love and friendship, to female beauty and refinement, as well as motherhood, mortality, and death. Contributors include Frederick Douglass (1881-1895), William Lloyd Garrison (1805-1879), James McCune Smith (1813-1865), Lucy Stone (1818-1893), Sarah Forten Purvis (1814-1883), and Margaretta Forten (1815-1887).
Collection predominantly of negatives depicting informal portraits, residences, and the survey work of members of the related Quaker Webster and Smedley families, 1885-1905.
Montgomery P. Simons (1816-1877), one of the earliest practitioners of photography in Philadelphia, was also a successful photographer of stereographs. The Library’s stereograph holdings contains several of Philadelphia businesses, religious institutions, and public buildings and spaces from the Simons studio circa 1865-circa 1875. A large number of the stereographs show Fairmount Park and Water Works in addition to views of churches, including St. James the Less (East Falls) and Holy Trinity (6th and Spruce streets). Images depicting the Betsy Ross House, Custom House, the Post Office, State House, and Headhouse Market are also found in the stereographs as well as views of banks, the Apprentice Library, and the Wire Suspension Bridge at Fairmount. In addition, the collection includes panoramic views, most from the State House, but also one from the La Pierre House (Broad Street) showing Penn Square.
Bartlett & Smith was a partnership from circa 1867- 1869 between George O. Bartlett and a photographer named Smith. Over 20 stereographs depicting Philadelphia views including commercial buildings along Chestnut Street including the Jayne Building, the Continental Hotel, the United States Custom House, and First National Bank; buildings along Broad Street, including the Union League, LaPierre House, and Broad Street Presbyterian Church; the Chestnut Street Bridge over the Schuylkill River; and the Wissahickon.
Two stereographs from this collection were not digitized, [Chestnut St. west of 6th St. with Jayne Building] [(8)1322.F.23h] and View on the Wissahicken near Philla. [(8)1322.F.8].
George O. Bartlett and William French were in partnership circa 1867-1869. Collection of Bartlett and French stereographs depicting Philadelphia streetscapes, including Chestnut Street; public buildings, including the State House, Post Office, and Custom House; cultural institutions, including the Academy of Natural Sciences and Horticultural Hall on Broad Street; and Fairmount Waterworks. Many views are from the series, Gems of Penn’a scenery, Philadelphia and vicinity.
The McAllister & Brother firm descended from the Scottish émigré´ John McAllister Sr. (1786-1866) who operated a store in Philadelphia from the late eighteenth throughout the nineteenth century. The business, originally a cane and whip manufactory, evolved over the years to become a spectacle shop and later the premier opticians’ shop of the city. The shop sold lenses, cameras, and stereoviewers and served a major role in the development and the promotion of early photography.
The McAllister & Brother Stereograph Collection comprises some of the oldest photographic views of Philadelphia church exteriors and interiors. Issued circa 1860-circa 1863, the photographs provide images of such prominent religious structures as Christ Church, St. Peter’s Church, Gloria Dei, and St. Mark’s Church.
Collection of photographs by Odiorne of commercial streets in center city Philadelphia east of 10th Street. Primarily documents Chestnut Street between 6th and 10th Streets, including views from Odiorne’s photographic studio at 920 Chestnut Street showing a variety of retail businesses and several large hotels. Hotels depicted include Continental Hotel, Girard House, and Washington House. Also contains views of the area near Dock Street and the Delaware River waterfront showing boarding houses, hotels, liquor stores, and oyster saloons; 5th Street near Arch Street, including images of Garrigues & Magee Manufacturing Chemists, suppliers of photographic chemicals and William Wilson & Son, manufacturers of silver ware; residences near 4th and Pine Streets; and Franklin Square. Also includes images of the Market Street market sheds, and a police station. Several of the views are snow scenes.
Philadelphia photographer Henry B. Odiorne (1805-1860) worked out of Isaac Rehn’s Gallery at 920 Chestnut Street 1859-1860.
Collection of 38 views of properties owned by Jackson-Cross Company, a commercial real estate firm founded by Joseph T. Jackson in 1876. The company merged with the Cross Company in 1936 and became Jackson-Cross Company. The firm operated until 1998 when Insignia Financial Group acquired it. The collection depicts a number of sites throughout Philadelphia during the 1940s, including office buildings, industrial sites, hospitals, banks, and stores and shops.
Broadsides, certificates, songs and prayers reflecting Pennsylvania German-American folk culture collected by Don Yoder and William Woys Weaver, mostly 19th century.
Collection of negatives taken 1900-1910 by Philadelphia music teacher and amateur photographer Frank Berry (b. 1863). Images primarily document Berry's neighborhood in the Manayunk section of Philadelphia and the nearby Wissahickon Valley. Contains images of scenes and buildings in Manayunk including Berry's home on Righter Street; friends and family posed for informal portraits; children engaged in recreational activities including sledding, biking, boating, fishing, and swimming; bridges, trails, and landscapes in the Wissahickon Valley; the construction of Walnut Lane Bridge (1906-1908); and several beach scenes. Also includes views of the Historical Pageant in 1912; the Northeast Manual Training School; St. Stephen's Episcopal Church; altar decorations; Josephine Berry playing a piano; a man posed with a motorcycle; the family Christmas tree; a childrens' street band; a liquor store at 5226 Ridge Avenue; Berry with his camera; and children taking photographs.
James McClees (1821-1887), a pioneer Philadelphia photographer, produced a significant number of the oldest paper photographs held in the graphics collection. The views, dated 1853-1859, depict prominent residential, public, and commercial buildings that document the changing architectural landscape of the city of Philadelphia. A large number of the images show churches and educational institutions, including Seventh Presbyterian Church, Dr. Chamber’s Independent Church, the Fourth Baptist Church, Central High School, Jefferson Medical College, and the Spring Garden Institute. In addition, views of the Old London Coffee House, the Graff house, the State House, and Chestnut Street Theatre record the historic city that was becoming overshadowed by newer construction such as the Farmers and Mechanics Bank, Spring Garden Institute, and the West Philadelphia Water Works. McClees also photographed prominent residences; bridges over the Schuylkill; the aftermath of the 1856 fire at Sixth and Market streets; businesses and industries, including his daguerreotype studio; cemeteries, theaters; hotels; the Fairmount Water Works; and the Academy of Natural Sciences. A series of panoramic views of the city from the State House steeple forms the collection as well.
Part of a series of progress photographs by Philadelphia commercial photographer William Nicholson Jennings (1860-1946) commissioned by the builders Irwin & Leighton to document the construction of the Fidelity-Philadelphia Trust Company building, March 1927-early 1928. Images show the clearing of the site, laying of the foundations, the erection of steel framing, the progress of exterior masonry work and the completed building. Also contains interior views of the framing between floors and details of the ornamental doorway.
Collection of 182 lantern slides photographed 1870-1916 by Philadelphia photographer and Photo-Secessionist John C. Bullock (1854-1939) predominately depicting views of colonial-era residences and landmarks on Germantown Avenue. The Germantown Avenue views, most created 1910-1915, illustrate the third edition of Charles F. Jenkins’ local history book The Guide Book to Historic Germantown. Collection also includes images of historic sites in Center City and rural landscape.
Collection of 250 portrait photographs on postcard stock depicting residents of South Philadelphia and Kensington by amateur photographer John Frank Keith (1883-1947), ca. 1910-ca. 1940. Keith documented hundreds of, typically unidentified, working-class Philadelphians, individually, and as groups standing on sidewalks, in front of streetscape, and sitting on stoops. The majority of photographs date to the 1920s and show men, women, and children.
Seventeen photographs (1894-ca. 1945) by Philadelphia amateur photographer, teamster, and machinist Eugene Davis. Images primarily document the electrification, beginning in 1894, of Philadelphia’s first horse railway line operated by the Frankford and Southwark City Passenger Railway Company. Includes views of horse-drawn cars and electric trollies. Collection also contains images of location of Davis’s machinist shop Walker & Davis, Inc. with partner Noah Walker, and other vehicles, including an autogiro, a Ford Model T truck, delivery carts and wagons, and the beached cruise ship, Morro Castle.
The Civil War Graphics and Ephemera Collection is primarily comprised of the John A. McAllister Collection. The collection includes tens of thousands of examples of printed ephemera, most from the Civil War years, including circa 600 recruiting posters, as well as newspapers, political broadside and leaflets, tickets, trade cards, cartoons, and a complement of ribbons, buttons and other ephemeral items constituting the largest such collection documenting the Philadelphia home front. The collection of graphic items includes lithographs, engravings, cartoons, maps, textiles, drawings, photographs, and about 7,000 patriotic pictorial envelopes. Additionally, mixed media holdings within the collection document sanitary fairs, voluntary saloons and hospitals, generals and leaders, playing cards, verse, and Confederate States ephemera.
The McAllister Graphics Collection of prints, ephemera, and scrapbooks reflect the collecting efforts of Philadelphia antiquarian John A. McAllister (1822-1896) during the Civil War. The Civil War graphics include prints and photographs of camps, forts and battlefields; political cartoons; portraiture; certificates; architectural and engineering plans; textiles and ephemera. A large segment of the prints are lithographic views of camps and battle scenes, with over 100 printed by the Philadelphia printer L.N. Rosenthal and New York firm Currier & Ives as well as a small number printed on textiles by Boston Chemical Printing Company. Also significant is the Civil War ephemera, which includes envelopes, stationery, and paper novelties such as toy soldiers. The Civil War Envelope and Stationery collections contain over 7,000 items illustrated with patriotic designs and slogans. Several envelopes by prolific publishers King & Baird and Charles Magnus are included in this collection. A smaller ephemera collection is the Civil War paper soldiers. The paper toys, a small number published by McLoughlin Bros. and G. Heerbrandt, depict soldiers from over a dozen different New York regiments. Three scrapbooks of Civil War envelopes and portrait prints and photographs of prominent military and political figures also comprise collection.
Collection of landscape photographs taken 1885-1900 by Philadelphia-area naturalist photographer and Photo-Secessionist Robert Redfield (1849-1923). Images primarily depict the Brandywine Creek and Mill Creek (PA); Twin Lakes (CT); and Mount Washington (MA) as well as unidentified creeks and streams. Many of the views include people at recreation and sheep or cows. Collection also includes views of the office and darkroom of the Photographic Society of Philadelphia (South Fifteenth Street) and the photographer’s residence in Wayne, Pennsylvania.
Collection of over 2500 glass and film negatives, photographic prints, and lantern slides taken by amateur Philadelphia photographer Marriott C. Morris (1863-1948). A member of a prominent Quaker family descended from Philadelphia merchant Anthony Morris, Morris was also a philanthropist, executor and trustee of estates, and founder of the Germantown Boys’ Club. Images include formal and candid portraits of the extended Morris family and friends, views from family travels to Bermuda, the Poconos, and the family summer homes "Avocado" and “Cedar Mer” in Sea Girt, New Jersey. The collection also features numerous photographs of Germantown, including several depicting the exterior and interior of the family residence the Deshler-Morris House (5442 Germantown Ave) and Boys’ Parlor building and excursions.
Other images depict Philadelphia and the nearby area, including Haverford College, Pelham (Philadelphia, Pa.), Cedar Grove (Montgomery County, Pa.), Delaware Water Gap, and Olney, Pa.; Haddonfield, N.J., Wilmington, De.; Catskills; the coast of Maine; Lake Hopatcong, N.J.; the Natural Bridge, Va.; Baltimore, Md.; West Point, N.Y.; the Chicago World’s Fair of 1893; views of railroad excursions, including the Catawissa Railroad and Shenandoah Valley Railroad; and Pennsylvania and New Jersey Friends’ meeting houses. Also contains a small number of negatives photographed by the photographer’s mother Martha Canby Morris, and his brother Samuel Canby Morris.
Scrapbook of print specimens, proofs, and original drawings primarily delineated and compiled by German-born Philadelphia engraver John Serz (1808-1881), an engraver, professor of drawing at the Philadelphia Conservatory of Music, and president and secretary of the old Artists Club. Contents include book and periodical illustrations; separately-issued views; portrait prints; certificates; and job printing specimens. Majority of graphics depict religious, landscape, historical, genre, and fashion views, including plates from "Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Other Principal Saints" (New York, 1864); Auerbach’s "Tales of the Black Forest"; Sartain’s Magazine; Graham’s Illustrated Magazine; W. Alvin Lloyd’s Railroad Guide; and Demorest’s Monthly Magazine.
Scrapbooks compiled by Mary Rebecca Darby Smith (1814-1886), the daughter of Philadelphia Quakers Hannah Logan Fisher (1777-1846) and James Smith (d. 1826) and great great granddaughter of scholar and William Penn’s secretary James Logan (1674-1751). Smith was an author, poet, a world traveler, autograph collector, and socialite.
Scrapbooks contain printed and original art works; photographic reproductions of art works, including sculpture; book and periodical illustrations; and newspaper clippings. Subjects of the imagery include American and European landscapes and marinescapes; views of European cities, landmarks, and historical sites; portraiture, including Queen Victoria; views of animals; scenes of rural life; figure studies; and allegorical, religious, and sentimental (often courtship) scenes.
Photomechanical reproduction of a mechanical drawing of a cross section of the pumping machinery for the waterworks, including the boiler and reservoirs, which when full were able to hold 17,660 gallons of water. Also includes smaller vignettes in the upper left and right corners showing the elevation and plan of the waterworks. The neo-classical style marble pump house was completed in 1800 after the designs of architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe, in the tree-lined public square at High (Market) and Broad streets. The city's first waterworks delivered water from the Schuylkill River to subscribers and city hydrants until 1815, when superseded by the Fairmount Waterworks. The pump house was razed in 1827.
Collection of stereographs issued circa 1855-circa 1862 by pioneer Philadelphia photographers William and Frederick Langenheim , the first publishers of stereoviews in the United States in 1854. Photographs show business interiors, panoramic views of the city, Fairmount Park, including Laurel Hill Cemetery, and scenes along the Delaware Riverfront. Businesses depicted include jewelers Bailey & Co., hatter Charles Oakford, and opticians McAllister and Brother.
Collection of primarily racist social caricatures lampooning the etiquette and conventions of early 19th-century, middle-class Philadelphians, particularly the growing community of free African American persons. Eliciting the heightened racism in the antebellum North, the African American men, women, and children characters are depicted with exaggerated features, wearing boldly-patterned and colored clothes, and speaking in a vernacular to be portrayed and denigrated as illegitimate elite society. Caricatures address courtship, consumerism, society balls, fashion, freemasonry, and the election of Andrew Jackson. Some caricatures also represent the sexism of the era.
Originally published in Philadelphia as a set of fourteen prints; the first eleven were issued in 1828 and 1829 by William Simpson, a proprietor of a "fancy store." Sarah Hart and Son, stationers, published plates 12 and 13 in 1829. The last plate was issued by Sarah Hart alone in 1830. Probably in 1830 Sarah Hart reprinted the entire series. Additional African American caricatures by Clay, "Sketches of Character. At Home. Abroad," "The Dead Cut," "Back to Back," and "Philadelphia Fashions" published between 1829 and 1837 have generally been accepted and are identified as a part of the series., LCP holds entire series. Ten of the fourteen are first editions and four are reprints.
LCP AR [Annual Report] 1967 p. 51-53; 1968 p. 18-20.
Nancy Reynolds Davison's E.W. Clay: American Political Caricaturist of the Jacksonian Era. (PhD. diss., The University of Michigan, 1980), p. 85-100.
Nancy R. Davison, ‘E.W Clay’s Life in Philadelphia: A Moment in Time,’ Imprint: Journal of the American Historical Print Collector’s Society (Autumn 2018), p. 2-29.
Jean Fagen Yellin and John Van Horne, eds. The Abolitionist Sisterhood (Ithaca: Cornell University Press in cooperation with the Library Company of Philadelphia, 1994), p. 218-222.
Jasmine Cobb, Picture freedom: Remaking Black visuality in the 19th century (New York: New York University Press, 2015), p. 148-220.
Bulk of collection was accessioned in 1999. One print (5656.F.39) accessioned in 1893. Several of the prints were acquired and/or accessioned between 1968 and 1971.
Added to African Americana Digital Collection through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education through the Office of the Commonwealth Libraries, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, Governor, 2013-2014.
Collection of illustrated ephemera, primarily trade cards, envelopes, receipts, letterheads, billheads, and labels, for predominantly Pennsylvania businesses and trades, ca. 1830-ca. 1910.
Printed ephemera related to American business and commerce. Predominantly consists of over 150 pieces of printed advertising ephemera sent by suppliers of stationery and related products to the Philadelphia firm John C. Clark from 1866 to 1868.
Later 19th-century watercolors, many commissioned by antiquarian and jeweler Ferdinand J. Dreer (1812-1902), from a collection of over 150 views of Philadelphia streetscapes by architect and artist Benjamin R. Evans. Some of the images are based on earlier prints, drawing, and photographs of the depicted site.
Creator
Evans, B. R. (Benjamin Ridgway), fl. 1857-1891, Creator
Album of snapshots showing the Logan family residence Loudoun erected for Thomas Armat (photographer's great grandfather) in 1800 at 4650 Germantown Avenue and Stenton, the Logan family country seat at 4601 North Eighteenth Street in Germantown.
Collection of photographs, including a series created by Philadelphia professional photographer, William Rau, along with architectural drawings, photomechanical prints, sketches, lithographs and etchings, depicting the Capitol during its construction from 1901 to 1906.
Souvenir viewbook, probably issued during the Centennial Exhibition of 1876, containing fifteen captioned views of prominent sites and landmarks in the city.
Album and loose prints compiled by a member of the African American Stevens-Cogdell/Sanders-Venning family containing portrait photographs of family and friends, ca. 1860-ca. 1925.
This collection includes historical materials or references to or descriptions of historical materials that may be considered offensive or harmful. Historical records are evidence of the time in which they were created and often contain language and images that are racist, homophobic, sexist, ableist, or otherwise derogatory and insensitive. The Library Company takes responsibility for these materials and their importance for the study of the past seriously. The Library does not endorse the views expressed in these materials.
If you encounter language in this digitized collection, or elsewhere that you find offensive or harmful, or if you have questions about the statement above or about our work, we welcome your feedback. A full statement and feedback form where you can alert us of potentially harmful material is here.
The Race and Visual Culture Digital Collection contains historical visual material and popular art works, often racist in content, that pertain to the visual culture of race and its social, cultural, and historical complexities and biases. The collection, in correlation with the African American History Graphics Digital Collection, includes over 1,600 images and descriptions of visual material that depict or reference the BIPOC community between the 18th and 20th centuries. The sub collections contained within are arranged by date spans based on the creation date of the item. The supplied titles, descriptions, and subject headings were reviewed, revised, and remediated to include anti-racist language as part of a 2021-2022 remediation cataloging project of our African American History Graphics Collection. Many records still include legacy Library of Congress Subject Headings, which conform to national and institutional cataloging standards that are under review for their continued public use in our catalogs. The collection was first published in 2023.
Resources:
Antracoli, Alexis A., Annalise Berdini, Kelly Bolding, Faith Charlton, Amanda Ferrara, Valencia Johnson, and Katy Rawdon. “Archives for Black Lives in Philadelphia: Anti-Racist Description Resources.” October 2020.
https://archivesforblacklives.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/ardr_202010.pdf
Berry, Dorothy. Descriptive Equity and Clarity around Blackface Minstrelsy in H(arvard) T(heater) C(ollection) Collections, 2021.
https://www.dorothy-berry.com/minstrel-description
Jeannet, Paula. “The Ethics of Describing Images: Representing Racial Identities in Photographic Collections,” Catalogue & Index, March 2021.
https://cdn.ymaws.com/www.cilip.org.uk/resource/collection/CC45A47F-BE48-4BA1-B6D4-25BF10F1BC41/C&I202Jeannet_describing_images.pdf
The Philadelphia on Stone Digital Catalog contains over 1300 lithographs, related ephemera, and prints documenting Philadelphia commercial lithography between 1828 and 1878 derived from the surveys conducted at eight collaborating institutions between May 2007 and May 2010. Lithographs listed in Nicholas Wainwright’s Philadelphia in the Romantic Age of Lithography (1958), lithographs not listed in Wainwright portraying the built environment of Philadelphia, and advertisements for and printed views of Philadelphia lithographic establishments form the core content of the records and images contained in this catalog.
Each catalog record contains the name of the holding institution of the item(s) described and is the repository who should be contacted to obtain reproductions of prints not held in the collections at the Library Company of Philadelphia.
The Library Company Papers Project is a three-year, NEH-funded project to review, process, and digitize institutional records from the institution’s founding in 1731 through 1881.
