Visions of America: The Stephen White Collection

Unbound compilation comprised of 50 pages of text (accompanied by 50 photostatic copy documents) and 32 period silver gelatin prints of the original album pages of portraits of Abraham Lincoln. The prints measure approx. 12 x 10 in. overall (including margins), with the majority featuring 4 portraits per page, each approx. 3 1/4 x 2 1/8 in. Two prints feature single portraits/scenes, each approx. 7 1/4 x 5 in. The portraits represent all of the then known photographs of Abraham Lincoln, which had been printed from the original negatives that were held in the Frederick Hill Meserve Collection. The portraits are individually numbered and arranged by topic as follows: Frontispiece, a copy of the portrait of Lincoln originally taken by Anthony Berger at Mathew Brady's Washington Gallery in February 1864 (1); The Photographs of Abraham Lincoln (100); Lincoln at Gettysburg (3); Photographs of the Vice-Presidents, the Speakers, Members of the Cabinet and Others (24); and the Internment of the body of President Lincoln in the vault of Oak Ridge Cemetery, Springfield, IL, 4 May 1865 (1). A photostatic copy of a typed letter from N. Taylor Phillips to Isaac Markens is also included, in which Phillips describes a photograph in his possession that he identifies as the "last photograph taken of the lamented President." He notes that he would be glad to give a copy of the photograph to Mr. Markens.

A unique and exceptionally important piece representing the first serious attempt to catalogue the photographs of Abraham Lincoln. Meserve's compilation remained the definitive catalogue of Lincoln photographs until it was expanded upon by Lloyd Ostendorf and Charles Hamilton in 1963, who dedicated their work, now considered exhaustive, “To the Distinguished Historian Frederick Hill Meserve."