[Bridgeport, Connecticut: circa 1870-1910].
Price: $5,000.00
A small collection of four glass lantern slides, 21 black and white photographs, and additional ephemera from the library of Connecticut phycologist Isaac Holden, founding editor and contributor to the *Phycotheca Boreali-Americana: A Collection of Dried Specimens of the Algae of North America*. The collection consists of miscellaneous materials documenting two of Bridgeport’s leading manufacturers, Isaac Holden and William Skilling Mills, and includes evidence of their ties to circus impresario P.T. Barnum. Two of the glass slides are partially damaged, else very good overall.
Born in 1832, Holden graduated from Dartmouth College and began his career as a teacher specializing in the preparation of young men for college and scientific schools. He gave up teaching in 1872 to join the Wheeler & Wilson Company in Bridgeport (manufacturers of sewing machines), becoming Vice President and in charge of the business until his death in 1903. His interest in botany was lifelong, and he spent the last fifteen years of his life researching and collecting marine algae at Sea Island Park on the Connecticut coast and Long Island Sound, as well as the inland fresh water streams and lakes.
Among the photographs are several family portraits (including the patriarch of the Mills family, Dwight Phelps Mills), and images of various family members and friends out and about in Bridgeport and Naugatuck. Also included are photographs of rugged landscapes and rocky coastline (including Australia and Maine). The four glass lantern slides consist of a view of P.T. Barnum's elephants being paraded across Bridgeport’s new iron draw bridge (1888), and three unidentified portraits: a young woman in ballet slippers resembling one of P.T. Barnum's Circassian beauties; a very old woman with a remarkable furrowed face; and a very young boy.
The ephemera consists mostly of printed and engraved cards, etc.: Rewards of Merit, religious and calling cards (some of which are inscribed), and woven keepsakes. Of special interest are several calling cards and identified family photographs that link the Holden family to the Stanley Brothers of Maine, the earliest manufacturers of dry plate glass negatives and slides in the 1880s.
A compelling small archive from this leading Bridgeport man, member of the New England Botanical Club and president of the Bridgeport Scientific Society, documenting the life of the city when Barnum was mayor and Olmstead had created Sea Island Park. A detailed list is available.
Item #394188
