Daguerreotype portrait of John Romeyn Brodhead. London: Mayall, 1848

A splendid half-plate daguerreotype of Herman Melville’s advisor and agent John Brodhead, scholar and diplomat.

John Romeyn Brodhead (1814-1873) was a historian and a member of the American diplomatic corps. Best remembered for his services as Herman Melville’s agent in London, Brodhead had known Melville and his family since their youth.

$11,000

Cornelius Vanderbilt, vignetted standing portrait. [New York: Mathew Brady Studio, 1860s.]

Founder of the Vanderbilt business dynasty, Cornelius Vanderbilt made his fortune first in steamships and shipping and then in railroads. His career spanned the birth of the steamship and the development of the great American railroad networks. He was “the oldest and perhaps the greatest of the nineteenth-century railroad barons” (ANB). Grand Central Station and Vanderbilt University stand as testaments to his influence and wealth.

$9,500

David T. Valentine. New York and Washington: Brady Studio, c. late 1850s

This is a delightful Brady Imperial salt print portrait of one of the fascinating political and literary characters of mid-nineteenth-century New York, David T. Valentine.

$9,500

Stumbling Bear, Kiowa Chief. Fort Sill, Indian Territory, c. 1869-74

Photographer Will Soule arrived at Fort Sill in Indian Territory in late 1869 or early 1870. Fort Sill was then a military headquarters and agency for several Indian tribes, including the Kiowa.  Before returning to Boston in 1874, Soule made an important series of Native American portraits, including this charismatic image of Chief Stumbling Bear.

$9,500

Thubten Gyatso, 13th Dalai Lama. [Calcutta?], c. 1910

Thubten Gyatso, born in 1876, was recognized as the 13th incarnation of the Dalai Lama in 1878, and in 1895 he assumed ruling power. Over the next twenty years, he helped Tibet navigate perilous diplomatic and political seas, enduring periods of exile in 1904-1909 and 1910-1913. Tibet finally declared its independence under his leadership in 1913. He helped modernize Tibet and established the moral, political, and diplomatic authority of the Dalai Lama to an unprecedented degree.

This fine studio portrait may have been taken in Calcutta in 1910 when the Dalai Lama went there at the invitation of the British Viceroy, Lord Minto. The present Dalai Lama, the 14th, was identified after the death of death of Thubten Gyatso in 1933.

$8,500

Henry A. Wise. New York and Washington: Brady Studio, c. late 1850s

This is a dramatic full-length standing salt print portrait of Gov. Henry A. Wise by Mathew Brady.

$7,500

Illustrated manuscript and typescript memoir of her partner, “Mary Cary Packard R. N.” [and] Autograph manuscript autobiography, “Miss Sallie.”. Baltimore, 1937 and 1940

Mary Cary Packard (1858-1936) and Sarah F. Martin (b. 1864) met as nursing students at Massachusetts General Hospital, one of the first nurse training programs in America. Upon graduation the two moved to Baltimore where they were said to be the only two registered trained nurses in the state of Maryland. Packard and Martin were in charge of nursing at the Robert Garrett Hospital for Children for twenty-five years. They spent summers at the Garrett Sanatorium for Children in rural Mt. Airy. The two pioneered public health nursing in the state, and they played central leadership roles in organizing the nursing profession in Maryland.

$5,500

Black woman with white child. No place, c. 1870-90

This delightful photograph shows a kind-looking young black woman sitting with a somewhat sour-looking young white child. Both are finely dressed for the occasion, the woman in an elegant dress with lace collar and the child in a dress with an elaborate lace collar. The photographer has highlighted in gold the fine jewelry each wears

$3,800

Portrait of Artists Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera. Mexico City, 1952, printed 2017

$3,500

Fabulous Albumen Photograph depicting Richardson and his great-grandson as they appeared in the Statue of Liberty Parade in New York. New York: Benjamin Richardson, c. 1886

Benjamin Richardson, the great collector of patriotic Americana, owned and rode in George Washington’s carriage in the Statue of Liberty dedication paradise in New York in 1886.

$3,500