Full-length studio CDV portrait of William A.G. Brown. [Virginia City, Nevada]: Sutterley Brothers, ca 1866. Period ink inscription to mount verso reads," Wm. A G Brown" alongside a partially obliterated photographer's imprint.

An excellent portrait of Black pioneer and saloon-owner, William A.G. Brown. Free-born in Massachusetts circa 1830, not much is known of Brown's early life, though some historians speculate that he gained early work experience in restaurants or hotels. He immigrated west in 1863, settling in Virginia City, Nevada, a boomtown settled in 1859 upon the discovery of silver in the monumentally productive Comstock Lode. Brown was joined by immigrants from across the globe attracted by the prospect of silver wealth. Initially a shoeshine, he opened the Boston Saloon on B Street, described as being on "an upslope location along Virginia City's mountainside setting and well beyond the center of town."

Although there were dozens of saloons operating in Virginia City by the early 1860s, none yet catered to the Black community. The African American populations was not district limited like the Chinese populations, but rather spread across town. By 1866, it must have had reached success and moved locations to the more central location on the corner of D and Union Street, in the heart of the vibrant business district. Excavation of the Boston Saloon occurred during several archaeological endeavors in 1990s and early 2000s, and revealed a high level of sophistication in the offerings of the Boston Saloon. Finds reveal French champagne, English soda water, and an early example of Tabasco hot sauce, first introduced in 1869, and the only Virginia City archaeological site to reveal such a bottle. The animal bones studied also showed expensive cuts of meat including an abundance of beef and sheep. The sophistication of offerings suggest that the clientele was affluent, and likely both Black and white. Brown sold the Boston Saloon in 1875 to retire, and the same year it was leveled in the Great Fire and was not rebuilt. (Kelly J. Dixon. "Archaeology of the Boston Saloon." African Diaspora Archaeology Newsletter. Vol. 9, Issue 2, June 2006).

The image was taken by Curtis and J.K. Sutterley, pioneering brothers who opened several studios throughout Nevada and Utah between 1865 and 1875. Though partly obliterated, almost certainly from the removal of a revenue stamp, the photographer's imprint is clearly that of J.K. and Clement Sutterley, with their "Sutterley Brothers, / Photographers, / Union Block, B. Street. cor. Taylor, / Virginia, N." imprint, comparable to other extant examples. They operated this studio from at least 1867 (Carl Mautz, Biographies of Western Photographers, pp. 320-321), however, the removed revenue stamp suggests a date of 1866, during the peak of the Boston Saloon's operation. Notably, the photographic studio and the Boston Saloon were only a block away from one another. J.K. Sutterley was apparently a well known figure in Virginia City, with the Gold Hill Daily News reporting that J.K. Sutterely celebrated his return to Virginia City purchasing "Hedger & Noe's gallery, Suttereley's old place, corner of C and Taylor streets" and "In order to mark the event properly he sent us some champagne, in bottles. It is not in bottles now. Sutterley is bound to succeed well always." (Gold HIll Daily News, 2 July 1872).

Images of Western pioneer African Americans are exceedingly scarce, especially those identified. As Weston Naef, founding curator of photography at the J. Paul Getty Museum notes in his introduction to Hidden Witness: African American Images from the Dawn of Photography to the Civil War by Jackie Napoleon Wilson,"such pictures are very rare to begin with - there were few African American photographers and very few black people had the money, time, or freedom for a portrait sitting - and those pictures that do exist are not well documented as to maker, place, subject, or date." This image is a powerful testament to the existence and vibrant life, both private and public, of an early Black business owner in an iconic Western mining boomtown.

Condition: some toning and spotting.

[African Americana, African American History, Western Expansion, Pioneer, Wild West, Comstock Lode, Mining History, Nevada, Early Photography, Historic Photography, Albumen, CDV, Carte de Visite, Cartes de Visite, Carte-de-Visite, Cabinet Cards] [African Americana, African American History, Black History, Historic Photography, Early Photography, Daguerreotype, Ambrotype, Tintype, Cased Images, Union Cases]