During the mid-nineteenth century photography exploded into popularity in Europe and the United States. Beginning with the introduction of the daguerreotype in 1839, the technique of using a chemical process to fix an image onto a sensitized metal plate captivated the imagination of many: those who wished to preserve the memory of a loved one, those who wished to record historical events, those who wished to create artistic impressions, and those who attempted to make a living satisfying the wishes of all the others. In the 1840s technical advances such as the calotype process made it possible to print photographs on paper, and by the 1850s the development of the collodion emulsion process began to reduce long exposure times. The collodion process represented a major change in the direction of photography, from the direct positive of the daguerreotype to negative/ positive printing. The collodion wet plate glass negative process using albumen emulsion prints was introduced in the United States in approximately 1855,1 and it was this process that contributed greatly to the popularization of photography because it made mass production of photographs possible.
With the use of a special camera, the collodion wet plate negative was equally capable of producing, on a single negative, eight identical exposures or eight individually exposed images. The developed wet plate negative was contact-printed onto thin albumen-sensitized paper, then exposed to the sun until the desired darkness was attained. The individual prints were then cut apart and mounted. The negatives were often kept on file by the photographer, so that additional copies could be made at any time.2
The format in which albumen prints from collodion wet plate negatives became most popular, was the carte de visite, which consisted of an albumen print measuring 2 1/2 " by 3 1/2" mounted on a staff card measuring 2 1/2" by 4 1/4". The process was patented in 1854 and popularized first in France by Andre Adolphe Eugene Disderi. The carte de visite's years of greatest popularity were 1859-66, and the last cartes de visite were produced in 1905.3 This format was most popular for portraiture, and many photographers throughout the United States were employed in the production of cartes de visite, particularly during the 1860s (Fig. 1).
In Carlisle, Pennsylvania, the general excitement about the new art of photography is evidenced by the number of different photographers active in the town beginning in the 1850s. These included Charles L. Lachman, Albert A. Line, E. K. Gaugler, H.H. Grove, Charles A. Saylor, Mrs. R. A. Reynolds (later known as Mrs. Smith), John N. Choate, and John C. Lesher. 4 Carlisle, for a century as the seat of Cumberland County, was a prominent market town and community center for central Pennsylvania. While not all the photographers named above were active in Carlisle at the same time, the town's population, which numbered 5,600 in 1860, was large enough- what with the officers at Carlisle Barracks, Dickinson College students and Indians- to support the businesses of several competing photographers. Charles L. Lachman, one of the most prominent, practiced photography from 1859-1874 in several different locations in Carlisle and Newville. His last Carlisle gallery, located in the Zug Building on the southeast corner of Market Square, was previously occupied by another photographer, John C. Lesher5 (Fig. 2).
History is, on the one hand, individual stories and, on the other, stories of groups, nations and cultures. In my recollection of classes I took when I was in college, the starting point was the latter, but in my recent experience of trying to write history, I began with individual stories I found in the Johnson Collection in the Cumberland County Historical Society - a collection of letters and papers of an African-American family in Carlisle.