{"id":29031,"date":"2024-06-30T01:03:23","date_gmt":"2024-06-30T05:03:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/?p=29031"},"modified":"2024-06-30T01:22:34","modified_gmt":"2024-06-30T05:22:34","slug":"the-mystery-of-frankie-d","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/the-mystery-of-frankie-d\/","title":{"rendered":"the mystery of Frankie D"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

A cased Ambrotype portrait c1862 with a mystery<\/p><\/div>\n

Toronto<\/strong>. The next step after the Daguerrotype was the use of glass plates. Initially glass plates used a wet solution (wet-plate) and years later a dry solution (dry-plate).<\/p>\n

To make the sensitized emulsion ‘hold’ to the glass, a sticky mixture of guncotton<\/a> was used (collodion). Guncotton itself was a liquid mixture of cotton and some acids.<\/p>\n

A spin-off of the wet-plate process was the Ambrotype – a cased image using the wet-plate to replace the Daguerreotype and allow other photographers to compete with the Daguerreotypists \u00a0using the less expensive Ambrotype process.<\/p>\n

A way down south (dem ol’ cotton fields of home) in Atlanta GA, the Daguerreian Society held its convention. There, one member asked another attendee (PHSC editor Bob Lansdale) a curious question: “What does Canada West mean?<\/em>“. It turned out he had an Ambrotype complete with the packaging and label addressed to someone in Hamilton, Canada West (now Ontario). Bob photographed the cased Ambrotype and its packaging.<\/p>\n

Bob writes, “A chance meeting this fall at the Daguerreian Symposium in Atlanta GA, brought forth the query from Robert Lisle of Hardeeville, South Carolina as to what Canada West meant. It was part of a script label on a box containing an ambrotype of a gentleman mounted in a thermoplastic case. I was intrigued as here I had a lead to a Canadian story.<\/p>\n

“The hand-written label was addressed to a mysterious Frank D???, Hamilton, Canada West.<\/p>\n

“I was allowed to photograph it thoroughly so back home I hit the library and found there were very few Franks. But persistency paid off as the 1862-63 Hamilton street directory provided a Frank Dunn, listed as a wine and spirit merchant. See page 20 for more details.”<\/p>\n

Wow! What an interesting find! Of course issue 36-3 with the full story was mailed to all paid members back then (more recent members can read 36-3 on their DVD (covers Photographic Canadiana<\/em> volumes 1 – 40)). Not yet a member? It’s easy – just follow the steps to the right, or view the MEMBERSHIP menu item above.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Toronto. The next step after the Daguerrotype was the use of glass plates. Initially glass plates used a wet solution (wet-plate) and years later a dry solution (dry-plate). To make the sensitized emulsion ‘hold’ to the glass, a sticky mixture … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1944],"tags":[169,2868,585],"class_list":["post-29031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-history","tag-ambrotype","tag-cased-images","tag-portrait"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29031","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29031"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29031\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29076,"href":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29031\/revisions\/29076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phsc.ca\/camera\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}