Carl Mautz Collection of Cartes-de-visite and Cabinet Photographs from the Western United States and Canada: Finding Aid photCL 581
Suzanne Oatey
The Huntington Library
November 2022
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, California 91108
Business Number: (626) 405-2191
reference@huntington.org
Contributing Institution:
The Huntington Library
Title: Carl Mautz collection of cartes-de-visite and cabinet photographs from the Western
United States and Canada
Identifier/Call Number: photCL 581
Physical Description:
28.3 Linear Feet
(19 binders, 14 boxes)
Date (inclusive): approximately
1860-1910
Abstract: A collection of approximately 7,000
cartes-de-visite and cabinet photograph portraits representing thousands of commercial
photographers operating in the American West, 1860-1910.
Language of Material: Materials are in
English.
Open for use by qualified researchers and by appointment. Please contact Reader Services at
the Huntington Library for more information.
The Huntington Library does not require that researchers request permission to quote from
or publish images of this material, nor does it charge fees for such activities. The
responsibility for identifying the copyright holder, if there is one, and obtaining
necessary permissions rests with the researcher.
[Identification of item]. Carl Mautz collection of cartes-de-visite and cabinet photographs
from the Western United States and Canada, The Huntington Library, San Marino,
California.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Purchased for the Huntington from Carl Mautz by the Library Collectors' Council, January
2016.
Carl Mautz was born in Portland, Oregon in 1943. He began collecting cartes-de-visite and
cabinet photographs from the early American West in 1974 while maintaining a law practice in
mountain towns of Northern California. He became increasingly interested in the imprints
found on the backs of these photographs, and the photographers about whom little to nothing
was known. In 1975, based on his own and other collectors' research, he published a small
guide called Checklist of Western Photographers, and continued hunting for unique imprints.
In 1997, after 20 more years of collecting, selling, conferring, and researching, Mautz
published a 600-page reference work titled Biographies of Western Photographers: A Reference
Guide to Photographers Working in the 19th Century American West, considered a seminal work
in the field of early Western photography. Mautz turned full-time to dealing in photographs
after he retired from practicing law in 1993. He also began a small publishing company and
has published 25 books pertaining to photography or local California history.
A collection of approximately 7,000 cartes-de-visite and cabinet photographs, almost
entirely portraits of ordinary people in the American West, photographed between
approximately 1860 and 1910. The photographs represent the work of thousands of commercial
photographers operating in every state west of the Mississippi, plus Wisconsin, which the
collector considered a western state given its frontier role in the migration of
photographers from the East to West. The collection includes 23 states and territories,
including Hawaii, and a few portraits from British Columbia and Western Canada. There are a
relatively small number of photographs from Alaska (1) and Arizona (6), not due to scarcity,
but because those parts of the collection were previously dispersed.
Portraits taken in California make up about half of the collection, representing
established photographers in big cities like San Francisco and Sacramento, as well as
lesser-known photographers in sparsely populated mountain towns. The people of the frontier
and post-frontier West posing in the portraits are mostly unidentified, though some images
do have handwritten names and dates. The majority of people pictured are white, with a
relatively small number of portraits of African American, Chinese, Latino, and Indigenous
persons. Sitters are of all ages, seen in individual poses or in family groups, in various
styles of clothing, hair, jewelry, props, and furniture. Images include soldiers, wedding
portraits, mothers with babies, children, frontiersmen, workers with tools, dogs, and
occasional outdoor images of buildings or people.
This collection was amassed over 35 years and became the primary source material for
Mautz's seminal reference work Biographies of Western Photographers (1997). The thousands of
imprints, some elaborately illustrated, include the names of several female photographers,
such as: Fannie Hoyt, Salt Lake City, Utah; Mrs. E. W. (Eliza) Withington, Ione City,
California; and Mrs. C. Klostermann, Eureka, California.
Processed by Suzanne Oatey in November 2022.
Organized in two series: 1. Cartes-de-visite (photographs); 2. Cabinet photographs
The collector's arrangement has been retained; within each series, photographs are
organized geographically by state, in alphabetical order.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
African Americans -- Photographs
Canada -- History -- 19th century
Children -- Photographs
Dogs -- Photographs
Families -- Photographs
Fashion -- United States -- History -- 19th century
Photographers -- Canada -- 19th century
Photographers -- United States -- 19th century
Portrait photography -- United States -- Photographs
West (U.S.) -- History -- 19th century
West (U.S.) -- History -- 20th century
Women photographers -- United States -- History -- 19th
century
Cabinet photographs
Card
photographs (photographs)
Cartes-de-visite (card photographs)
Photographs
Portraits
Postmortem photographs
Tintypes (photographs)
Moody, Z. F. (Zenas Ferry), 1832-1917
Ronan, Peter, 1839-1893
Taber, I. W. (Isaiah West), 1830-1912
Watkins, Carleton E., 1829-1916
Cartes-de-visite (photographs) approximately 1860-1890s
Physical Description: 19 Linear
Feet (19 binders)
Approximately 5,000 cartes-de-visite and a few tintypes, almost all portraits. The
carte-de-visite, or calling card photograph, is generally an albumen print mounted on
cardstock, 4 1/4 x 2 1/2 inches. Some photographs are hand colored or have handwritten
names written on the back. The binders contain about 200 to 250 photographs each.
Binder 1
Arizona; Arkansas; Southern California
Binder 2
Northern California, small towns and cities
Binder 3
Binder 4
California: San Francisco
Binder 5
Binder 6
Binder 7
California: Grass Valley; Nevada City
Collector Carl Mautz acquired some photographs from the William S. May family album
in Grass Valley, California around 1990. There are portraits of a young white couple,
May and his wife Anna (Conaway) May, and four African Americans - a man, Boz Harrison;
a woman, Hannah Harrison; and two girls, Minnie and Fannie Harrison. Anna's father,
Carville Conaway, arrived in California from Baltimore in 1851, settling in Grass
Valley with his family, who arrived later. The 1850 U.S. Federal Census shows that
Carville Conaway had three enslaved people in his household in Baltimore. It is
unclear if these are the same people. The tintype of Minnie Harrison has an imprint
indicating it was taken in Baltimore. Research information regarding these photographs
is in the collection information file. Please see Reader Services for more
information.
This binder also contains a street view of the Nevada City Courthouse; a group
portrait of four men and two horses in Nevada City; and two men in military uniforms.
Binder 8
Binder 9
Binder 10
California: Far north cities and towns; Traveling photographers
Contains portraits from Colusa, Red Bluff, Chico, Orland, Ukiah, Ferndale, Lakeport,
Eureka, Mendocino City, Fort Jones, Weaverville, Hayden Hill, Crescent City, Alturas,
Yreka, Downieville. Several portraits from the C.C. Richardson family album, Chico and
Richardson Springs, California. This binder also has cartes-de-visite by traveling
photographers, who worked in temporary set-up studios or sometimes worked on railroad
cars, moving from town to town. One image shows a group portrait of four men at a
table, one with an accordion.
Binder 11
Binder 12
Binder 13
Binder 14
Binder 15
Binder 16
New Mexico; Oregon
There are 14 photographs from New Mexico. One is a portrait of Lt. Peter Dumont Vroom
Jr. (1842-1926), U.S. Army Brigadier General. There is also an outdoor photograph of a
woman on a horse, with a view of a small Western town and boardwalk, taken by an
Albuquerque photographer. Portraits from Oregon include: Zenas Ferry Moody, 7th
governor of Oregon, his son, and 29 other portraits marked by the collector as "from
Governor Moody group."
Binder 17
Binder 18
Box 20
Alaska; Arizona; Arkansas; Southern California
There are few photographs from Alaska (1), Arizona (3) and Arkansas (11). One
Arkansas portrait depicts a little boy with a rifle. Southern California photographs
include portraits from Los Angeles, San Bernardino, San Diego, Santa Barbara, Ventura,
and other locations. There is a portrait of an African American woman and her baby,
with a name written on the back, possibly Mrs. H. G. Hodge. In addition, there are
several portraits of Italian American families that have names and writing in Italian
on the backs (San Luis Obispo).
Box 21
Box 22
Box 23
California, Northern: Nelson Point, Nevada City, Oakland, Oroville, Red Bluff, Redding, Sacramento, Salinas
Box 24
California, Northern: San Francisco
Includes portraits by prominent photographers Carleton Watkins, Isaiah W. Taber, and
the Dore Gallery. There are two portraits of babies in the same large seashell; one
has the imprint of Taber, the other of Watkins. Possibly Taber put his name on
Watkins' photograph; Taber purchased Watkins' negatives following Watkins' bankruptcy.
Other portraits of note are: men in traditional Scottish clothing with kilts;
individual portraits of African American women; Chinese Americans; and a white woman
posing in traditional Chinese clothing and hairstyle.
Box 25
Box 26
Box 28
Colorado; Dakota Territory; Hawaii; Idaho
Dakota Territory photographs include some imprinted with South Dakota or North
Dakota, which were taken after 1889, the year of statehood. Portraits include: a
soldier (Fort Collins, Colorado); a man on a bicycle (Colorado); painters and
carpenters with tools (Dakota); an East Indian man with rugs (Dakota); three portraits
of native Hawaiian women wearing Western-style dresses (Honolulu, Hawaii); an outdoor
group portrait of students and two wooden school buildings (Silver City, Idaho,
1884).
Box 29
Iowa; Kansas; Minnesota; Missouri; Montana
Portraits in Iowa include: a chemist measuring liquids in bottles; a man with two
guns in his belt; an outdoor image of a small church with steeple in Williamsburg.
Other portraits include: two individual portraits of African American men (Kansas); a
minister with Salvation Army button and violin (Kansas); a baker displaying bread
(Minnesota); a couple in front of a house with picket fence (Minnesota).
Box 30
Box 31
Box 32
Box 33
Washington; Wisconsin; Wyoming
Wisconsin portraits include: a man wearing Viking-style clothing; workers with tools
(a machinist and carpenters); men wearing fur coats; a man with blanket and small
medicine bag, identified as "Dr. Cole of West Lima." One portrait of a man wearing
railroad uniform, identified as a Union Pacific brakeman.
Box 27