1. CHARLES WEED The Original Big Tree, 1864, 6.9x8.6" on 8x8.6" beige mount with "The first Wellingtonia discovered in Calaveras" grove" in ink on the mount margin below the print. ASG# UNK/3600 Mammoth plate views of this are noted in the New York Public Library Collection. Here only a small section of the tree lies with a ladder up its side and was 92' in circumference and what was known as Stump House, both important early California landmarks.
2. CARLETON WATKINS Negative 1867 c., I.W. Taber Albumen print c. 1876 A 41 Glacier Point, 3257 feet, Yosemite Cal., Albumen 11x8" A classic view of the river and the high valley point. This print is mounted back to back on thick board to number 3 below
3. CARLETON WATKINS Negative 1867 c., I.W. Taber Albumen print c. 1876 A 48 Mirror Lake, Yosemite, Cal. Albumen 8.75x11.6" ASG# CWTB/1030

3 Albumen prints of Yosemite National Park and the Calaveras Grove of giant Sequoia Trees. Carleton Watkins was the leading photographer in California and Yosemite from 1860-1890.
Charles Leander Weed (1824-1903) came from Wisconsin to Sacramento, California, in the 1850s and opened a daguerrean photography studio. In 1858 he was employed by photographer Robert H. Vance (1825-1876) to operate the Vance's studio in Sacramento. Vance sent Weed to photograph river mining on the American River using the wet-plate collodion process. In 1859, Weed moved to the Vance Gallery in San Francisco and travelled with James H. Hutchings, editor of California Magazine, to photograph Yosemite Valley. Weed was the first to photograph Yosemite and by 1864 he was using his mammoth plate Camera in Yosemite.

Carlton E. Watkins (1829-1916) is renowned for his dramatic and balanced compositions of great trees, mountain valleys, and reflecting lakes; his primary subjects being Yosemite and other parts of the American West, particularly California. From 1860 to 1890 Watkins was America's most celebrated photographer. By 1864 Watkins was world famous for his mammoth plate views of Yosemite that were classically composed and ordered with an eye for the grand harmony and awe of man in nature, mastering the sublime.

During the financial crisis of 1875 he lost his studio and all his negatives to a swindler named J.J. Cook who took over Watkins's gallery along with photographer I.W. Taber, Devastated but unwilling to give up, Watkins began revisiting locations he had photographed in the 1860s in an effort to rebuild his inventory of negatives. He called these photographs "Watkins New Series," beginning in Yosemite. He continued over the next ten years to photograph throughout California and other western states.

In 1906 the San Francisco earthquake completely destroyed his studio and his life's work in photography. His health broke down and in 1910 his wife had him committed to the Napa State Hospital for the Insane where he languished for six years before dying on June 23, 1916 at age eighty-seven.

UNK/3600 Charles Weed The Original Big Tree Overall very nice, very rich tones overall with many tiny white spots visible from dust on negative, minor abrasions, wear and soiling
A 48 Mirror Lake, Yosemite, Cal. Overall light but rich print with mild abrasions, soiling and wear, a few brown spots in sky upper left
CWTB/1030 A 41 Glacier Point, Overall rich tones, mild abrasions, scrapes, wear, and soiling slight yellowing in sky, possible from edge of a piece of paper, overall good rich print