The Hayhow Family Bible

Recently a dilapidated family bible for the Hayhow family of Ontario Canada came into Olive Tree Genealogy’s hands. Inside were two pages of family births and deaths, tintype photos from the second half of the 19th century, and a few assorted documents.

 Over the next few weeks I will feature a half of the items individually, along with some research into the family.  I’ve done a bit already, enough to know that this Bible belonged to Charles and Ann (Higgins) Hayhow who married in 1863 in Ontario. 

Identifying Ancestor Photos: Tintypes

Genealogists often have old family photos in their possession or they find some in Great Aunt Matilda's attic. But how do we know when the photograph was taken? One method is to determine what type of photograph it is. 

Photography arrived in the United States in 1839 thanks to Samuel F. B. Morse, an American artist and inventor.The earliest type is the Daguerreotype. Ambrotypes followed, coming into use circa 1854. By 1855 Tinytypes had begun to replace Ambrotypes

Tintypes (circa 1855)

The Ferrotype process (tintypes) was introduced in the United States in 1855. It substituted an iron plate for glass and was even cheaper than the ambrotype. Because tintypes were placed in albums along with CDVs, they were often trimmed at the sides and corners.

Tintypes were produced in various sizes

• Full plate 6 1/2" x 8 1/2"
• Half plate 4 1/2" x 51/2"
• 1/4 plate 3 1/8" x 4 1/8"
• 1/6 plate 2 1/2" x 3 1/2"
• 1/9 plate 2" x 2 ½"
• Gem approximately 1/2" x 1"

Examples of Tintypes

Gem Tintype

9th plate Tintype

Watch my video on Five Types of Early 19th Century Photographs

Read more about Tintypes on Lost Faces website

Identifying Ancestor Photos: Tintypes

Genealogists often have old family photos in their possession or they find some in Great Aunt Matilda's attic. But how do we know when the photograph was taken? One method is to determine what type of photograph it is. 

Photography arrived in the United States in 1839 thanks to Samuel F. B. Morse, an American artist and inventor.The earliest type is the Daguerreotype. Ambrotypes followed, coming into use circa 1854. By 1855 Tinytypes had begun to replace Ambrotypes

Tintypes (circa 1855)

The Ferrotype process (tintypes) was introduced in the United States in 1855. It substituted an iron plate for glass and was even cheaper than the ambrotype. Because tintypes were placed in albums along with CDVs, they were often trimmed at the sides and corners.

Tintypes were produced in various sizes

• Full plate 6 1/2" x 8 1/2"
• Half plate 4 1/2" x 51/2"
• 1/4 plate 3 1/8" x 4 1/8"
• 1/6 plate 2 1/2" x 3 1/2"
• 1/9 plate 2" x 2 ½"
• Gem approximately 1/2" x 1"

Examples of Tintypes

Gem Tintype

9th plate Tintype

Watch my video on Five Types of Early 19th Century Photographs

Read more about Tintypes on Lost Faces website

So Many Goodies Coming to Lost Faces Photo Albums!

Look what arrived yesterday! Yep, another rescued antique photo album! Number 81.....and yes, it will be going online on my Lost Faces website ASAP.

I can't resist these beautiful albums with identified photos inside. They're never my ancestors but I still am driven to save them from being lost and forgotten.

I finally had a chance to unpack this album today and believe me, it was hard to wait. I'm like a kid at Christmas with these gorgeous albums chock full of family memories and treasures.

It's easy to picture what the album looked like when new. It would have been gleaming, clean and shiny. Imagine the family's excitement (or more likely the wife's excitement) when she bought it to put her treasured photos in.

Just look at this beauty! I am always so anxious to get going on the photgraphs - the CDVs, cabinet cards and tintypes, but I force myself to go slow. My first step is always to document the album and the order of photos inside, with camera pictures. That can help identify any photos that do not have names on them.

So I had a sneak peek and took a few camera photos to start the process. Let me share those with you.

 first page. It is empty but the name of the person whose photo was originally there is intact. That helps put together family groups and identify the family who may have originally owned the photo album. This empty page has the inscription  And the hunt is on! I'm so curious - who was Aunt Mariah? And was her husband's name really Whittier? It is difficult to read and I'm hoping that getting further into the album will reveal if I've managed to decipher it correctly.

The next page was just as intriguing. The photo slot was empty but written on the album page was "Aunt Hattie White's child" When oh when will I get to that ingriguing photo peeking out on the right? That was all I had time for today but tomorrow I will be back at the puzzle and continue with taking my camera photos and carefully documenting the album.

Please see Part 1 and Part 2 for the start of this process of how I rescue, archive, and publish on Lost Faces antique photo albums I save from disappearing.

Don't Miss My New Website Lost Faces!

Sarah (Page) Simpson 1840-1920

When I was about 11 years old, my grandmother gave me this photo of her grandmother (my great-great-grandmother), Sarah Simpson. Grandma told me it was taken in Ramsgate England sometime in the 1890s.

I was fascinated - she wore such a beautiful ornate hair piece! The gorgeous blouse or dress thrilled me with its ruffles and high collar. I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that I had part of this fine lady in me, in my blood and my genes.

I learned a lot about Sarah - widowed at the young age of 34, and pregnant with her 5th child, she was forced to work as a charwoman to feed her children. 

Not only did that spur me on to delving deeper into my British side of my family, it also sparked an immediate love of antique photos of ancestors. I thought about their lives - were they happy? Did they enjoy the same things I enjoyed? Did they get angry, or cry at the loss of a family pet. Yes those are the odd things I thought about as a youngster.

This early fascination with ancestors and photographs that captured one brief moment in their lives led to my determination to rescue and preserve as many old photos as possible. Several years ago I began purchasing entire albums of named photographs (Cartes de Visite and tintypes mostly) from the Civil War era, and offering scans of the photos to interested descendants. My dream was to one day publish them all online for genealogists to freely copy for their own personal use.

A few of my rescued Ambrotypes & Daguerreotypes

I am excited to announce my dream has come to fruition. Several years ago I was able to purchase the domain name "Lost Faces" from a woman who no longer wanted it.

This year I completed scanning and uploading approximately half of the precious albums I have rescued over the years. Every album is online with a description, a list of names, and at least a few photos from the album.

 There are 81 albums online at this point, and approximately half are complete, meaning all the photos in the albums are online for visitors to enjoy. Most albums have 50 photographs so you can see that is a lot of photos for visitors to enjoy and hopefully find an ancestor or two!

1916 Ramsgate England

As well as these wonderful album photographic treasures, Lost Faces contains dozens of single photos of groups - sports teams, class photos, and more. I also have vintage postcards for your enjoyment, and explanations of various early photograph types such as Cartes de Visite, Cabinet Cards, Tintypes, Ambrotypes, and Daguerreotypes. To top it all off I've added some brief tutorials on dating photographs through fashion, hairstyles, photographer marks and more.

Enjoy your visit to Lost Faces and feel free to download any photos for your own personal use. The only thing you cannot do is publish the photos anywhere else offline or online. Perhaps you'll find an ancestor in my rescues!

Is Your Ancestor on Lost Faces?

Have you ever wished you had a photo of a long ago ancestor? Wouldn't it be great to find out what great-grandpa Bert or great-grandma Olive looked like?

Lost Faces is a section of Olive Tree Genealogy website where I post photos from mid 1800s photo albums I rescue.

I choose albums with identified photographs so most photos have names attached. Civil War albums are gorgeous and here is a photo of a typical one.

Currently I have  70 antique photo albums online and each has from 30 to 50 photographs, so there are lots of photos and names. One might be your ancestor!

Here are a couple of examples to show you what might be found. This is a Carte de Visite taken during the Civil War

A small head and shoulders of a young man, identified by his initials.

A Cabinet Card of a young child, identified

Some albums have a great deal of information written on the album pages

If you have a few extra minutes, check out my YouTube video Five Types of Early 19th Century Photographs 

Learn to Recognize 5 Types of 19th Century Photographs

Personal Collection L. McGinnis Schulze

Do you need help to date a treasured photo found in grandma's trunk or shoebox in the attic? Were you lucky enough to inherit great-grandma's antique photo album? Then the video I created is for you! 
 

My  video shows early 19th century photographs and explains how to recognize each one. You can watch it on Olive Tree Genealogy YouTube Channel.

In the  video I introduce five types of photographs from 1839 on - Daguerreotypes, Ambrotypes, Tintypes, CDVs (Cartes de Visite) and Cabinet Cards. In the video you will learn about the time periods in which these various photographic techniques were used and see examples from my personal collection. 

You can also visit Lost Faces for more information on 19th Century photos and examples from Civil War era Photo Albums. Lost Faces also contains over 1,500 CDVs, Tintypes and Cabinet Cards from my collection.

I plan to make more videos on Dating Photographs Using Fashion, Hairstyles, Revenue Stamps, Type of Photograph and Photographer's markings. 

Organizing Family Photos - Creating a Plan

Today I decided the time has come to sort, scan and organize my physical photographs. I have thousands. Some are older family photos going back to 1900 from my mother, her sister, my aunt and my mother's cousin. Some are my family photos from when I was a child, and others are from my life since 1970. 

I also have my personal collection of CDVs, Cabinet Cards, tintypes, ambrotypes and daguerreotypes. I  estimated I have over 3,000 of those. 

To start with I am concentrating on my family photos. You can see most of what I have in the photo on the left.  

As you can see currently they are tossed into plastic tubs but I want to store them in archival quality boxes.

The first thing I did this morning was take a look to see what sizes of photographs I need to store. That allows me to determine the size of boxes I need and make an estimate as to how many will be required.

Then I started making my plan. First - I decided what my goal was for these photos - what is the final outcome I want? I know I want to eventually scan them all so I need one box for unscanned photos. Some have been scanned already and those are already sorted into tubs so that will be fairly quick to get into archival boxes when they arrive.

Any plan for organizing photos will depend on how you want to store them - by family groups? By time periods? By names of the person you are going to give them to? The choice is personal. I want to give some of mine to my adult children as soon as possible, others I want to keep for my grandchildren when they are older and some I want to hang on to myself.

I decided I needed 8 boxes to hold 4x6 photos, 1 box for 8x10 and 1 box for 11x14. With the 4x6 boxes I will have one box for photographs for each of my grown children, one for recent photographs I don't want to part with yet, one box for my life as a child growing up with my parents, one box for my maternal grandmother's family and one for my maternal grandfather's family. 

When my boxes arrive I will sort the photos I have already scanned and get them put away. Scanning the photos not yet scanned will be something I do in bits and pieces over the coming months.

Next week I will create an organizational plan for my personal collection of mid 19th century photos and share that. I still have to create a plan for my digitized and scanned photos so I will work on that later this week and share it here on Olive Tree Genealogy blog.

Looking for Photos of Early Black Families and Individuals in Ontario

This is a request for anyone who has, or knows of, 19th century photographs of black families living in Ontario. 

Schumacker Family of Salem Ontario

I've been approached by a historian at the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum) asking for help finding appropriate photos for a project.  

The historian is looking for early studio photos (ambrotypes, Daguereotypes, CDVs, tintypes, Cabinet Cards) as well as vernacular (candid and not posed) photos of more recent years.

The only resource I know of online is the Alvin McCurdy Collection at the Archives of ONtario. She is already using those in her study. I have sent her copies of the few that I have.

Copies of originals are acceptable for study or she is willing to purchase originals that might be for sale. Family albums are also of interest to her. If you have any photographs of Ontario black families that you would be willing to share or sell, please direct responses to me (Lorine) at olivetreegenealogy@gmail.com 

This sounds like a wonderful research project!

Identifying Photographs Part 2

The following article was originally written by Lorine McGinnis Schulze and published on Olive Tree Genealogy at http://www.olivetreegenealogy.com/photos/photo-types.shtml

It may not be reproduced in any way without my written consent.

Tintypes (circa 1855)

The Ferrotype process (tintypes) was introduced in the United States in 1855. It substituted an iron plate for glass and was even cheaper than the ambrotype. Because tintypes were placed in albums along with CDVs, they were often trimmed at the sides and corners. Tintypes were produced in various sizes

• Full plate 6 1/2" x 8 1/2"
• Half plate 4 1/2" x 51/2"
• 1/4 plate 3 1/8" x 4 1/8"
• 1/6 plate 2 1/2" x 3 1/2"
• 1/9 plate 2" x 2 ½"
• Gem approximately 1/2" x 1" 

Gem tintype ca 1860s. A Gem tintype could be 3/4" to 1" wide. Carte de visite sized card mounts (2½"x4") enclosed the gem and the finished item was known as a carte de visite tintype or ferrotype
9th plate ( 2 x 2.5) tintype in matte. Civil War Soldier
6th plate (2.5 x 3.5) tintype.

Next up I will talk about  Cartes de Visite and Cabinet Cards. Also see my YouTube Video Five Types of Early 19th Century Photographs 

Lost Faces Photo Album - Is one your ancestor?

This is another album in my collection of Civil War era photo albums. It appears to be mostly of the Chidester family and most of the photos are mid to late 1860s

Below is the list of names which were written on the album pages in period handwriting.

Most of the photos are CDVs (Cartes de Visite) but there are several early tintypes.

As I scan these photos front and back I will be putting them online on Lost Faces on my Olive Tree Genealogy website. They will join 63 other antique photo albums I have there.

1. blank
2. Uncle McKay and Aunt Lib
3. Grandma Chedister
4. Uncle Leander Chedister
5. Sadoc? Chidester
6. Aunt Jennie Pittenger
7. Uncle Frank Chidester
8. Uncle Grant Chidester
9. Uncle Earna Chidester
10. Lat? McKay
11. Unlce Vint and Aunt Huldah Deyo
12. blank
13. Uncle Elliot Chidester
14. Vinnie Larua Chidester Uncle Floyd
15. blank
16. Uncle Smith Thorp
17. Aunt Mandy Tharp
18. Fanny and Harvey Tharp
19. Uncle Grant
20. Aunt Almira Law
21. x Daughter Clara
22. Uncle Adam Law
23. blank
24. blank
25. Violet and Chas Strong
26. blank
27. Illinois Soldiers Indiana 1861
28. Cousin Leander Chidester
29. Lille Wiley McFadden
30. Hettie Pittenger (right) Daisy and Aunt Deyo
31. Daisy Perrin
32. Grandma Deyo
33. Frank Deyo
34. Alvira and Deyo
35. blank
36. Sadie McKay Duncan
37. May McKay Perry
38. Cousin Lurns grandchildren
39. blank
40. Uncle and Aunt Bissh who Pa staid [sic] with after he was 12 

5 Types of Early 19th Century Photographs - a YouTube Video

I'm very excited to introduce my FIRST video about early 19th century photographs! You can watch it on Olive Tree Genealogy YouTube Channel.

Do you need help to date a treasured photo found in grandma's trunk or shoebox in the attic? Were you lucky enough to inherit great-grandma's antique photo album? Then this video is for you!

In this video I introduce five types of photographs from 1839 on - Daguerreotypes, Ambrotypes, Tintypes, CDVs (Cartes de Visite) and Cabinet Cards. In the video you will learn about the time periods in which these various photographic techniques were used and see examples from my personal collection. 

You can also visit Lost Faces for more information on 19th Century photos and examples from Civil War era  Photo Albums. I will also be making videos on Dating Photographs Using Fashion, Hairstyles, Revenue Stamps, Type of Photograph and Photographer's markings. 

I have other videos planned in this series but what would YOU like to see? If I can create it, I will. 

Featured Foto from Lost Faces Photo Album of the Derr Family

This is a tintype of Eva, Ada & Ida Bushnell

It is part of my private collection of 1800s Photo Albums

This tintype was with the Derr Family Photo Album which is a Civil War Era Derr Family Album with CDVs (Cartes de Visites), circa 1860s.

Inscription inside cover reads: -- and Richard -- Cleveland

Inscription front page reads Mr. & Mrs. R. Derr, Ney Defiance Co. Ohio

Surnames in the identified photos: Derr, Prehn, Bartholomew, Stahl, Bushnell, Austen, Ward, Beavis, Brownlee, Garman, Gray, Green, Carter, Furst, Newcomb, Mott, Beck, Field, Wilson

Locations of photographers: Ohio, Kentucky, Pennsylvania

How an antique Illinois Family Photo Album came to Canada via New Jersey

My good friend Illya of LiveRoots.com recently sent me a gift of an antique photo album. The Album has had a rough life, and needed a good home, so Illya bid on it at a New Jersey auction, won the album and shipped it to me here in Canada.

The album has slots for 64 cabinet cards, and one tintype. 2 Cabinet Cards are missing, for a total of 63 ancestor family photos in this album. 15 of the Cabinet Card photographs were identified with writing on the album pages.

With the identification of those 15 photos and the clues from the photographers who took the photographs, I was able to find the family in the census for Chicago Illinois and determine that this album belonged to the Timmerman Family.

The Timmerman Family Photo Album is full of beautiful photographs, most taken in the period 1890 - 1910. Most of the photos were taken by photographers in Chicago Illinois - Morrison, Jaeger, Hoffman Studios, Vahlteich and others. A few were taken in Omaha Nebraska.

I wondered how a Chicago Photo Album over 100 years old ended up at a New Jersey auction, but research found that one of the Timmerman daughters (Bertha Timmerman) married a man named George Fichtner and moved from Chicago to Boontown New Jersey sometime between 1910 and 1920. No doubt the album was cared for by this daughter and her descendants for many years.

Olive Tree Genealogy has scanned several of the photos and published them online for all descendants and interested researchers to enjoy. I will be scanning all the photos and placing them all online in hopes that genealogists will recognize an ancestor. I've also written up the genealogy research I did on the Timmerman family and published it online as well. Hopefully interested descendants will enjoy this look into the family photographs of more than 100 years ago.

There are 55 other antique family photo albums (mostly from the Civil War era) online on Lost Faces on Olive Tree Genealogy website. Quality reproductions can be obtained for most of the 2,000 + photos by viewing thumbnails provided and choosing photographs of interest.