crackdog
Alexandra, Princess of Wales - Cabinet Card by William & Daniel Downey, London and Newcastle on Tyne 1883
She became Queen of the United Kingdom when her husband, Edward VII, became King in 1901.
More on her here:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexandra_of_Denmark
This was originally part of the Charles L. Ritzmann collection in New York. Ritzmann was a collector of celebrity photographs in the late 19th, early 20th century.
From an article by David S. Shields:
broadway.cas.sc.edu/content/collecting-theatrical-photogr...
"Austrian born Charles L. Ritzmann (1852-19??), whose gallery occupied 943 Broadway, began collecting celebrity photographs, including theatrical portraits, in the mid-1870s. Originally a dealer in “Guns, Revolvers, Rifles, Fishing Tackle, and Sporting Goods,” he converted his store into a palace of photographic celebrity in 1882. His premises imitated the great galleries of Gurney and Brady during the first age of commercial photography in New York. Yet since the creation of images was subordinate to the display and sale of every available image by every producer of imagery of every royal, politician, author, or performer of the age, the scope of Ritzmann’s collection far exceeded that of any other publically accessible. In 1887, for instance, it contained “350 different poses of Ellen Terry and more than 250 of Mrs. Langtry.”[30] In the following year he scored a singular coup, purchasing the surviving stock of Jose Maria Mora when that photographer went bankrupt. An observer remarked, “the unwary person who drops in to buy one picture remains a slave to many.”[31] Ritzmann issued celebrity photographs under his own brand under the late 1880s. He did not take these pictures himself; indeed some were rebranded images from other photographers whose stocks he cannibalized. Others were taken by anonymous operators. His photographic sitting room operated at a second premises 171 ½ Broadway. Ritzmann’s own fascinations in the 1890s tended toward New York real estate. Eventually he moved his gallery to 228 Fifth Avenue where it resided during the first decade of the twentieth century. Jerome Banning supplied an illustrated narrative account of going through the collection in a piece entitled “New York’s Museum of Photography”[32] He was generally reckoned the greatest retailer of celebrity photographs in New York City in the Gilded age and during the first decades of the twentieth century. When the direct retail sale of portraits diminished with the rise of the illustrated magazines, Ritzmann altered his business model, becoming an image brokerage supplying those magazines. He retired shortly after 1920 and a substantial portion of his stock appears to have been absorbed into the Culver Service collection at that time."
(Thank you to Clelia Conti for the info.)
Alexandra, Princess of Wales - Cabinet Card by William & Daniel Downey, London and Newcastle on Tyne 1883
She became Queen of the United Kingdom when her husband, Edward VII, became King in 1901.
More on her here:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexandra_of_Denmark
This was originally part of the Charles L. Ritzmann collection in New York. Ritzmann was a collector of celebrity photographs in the late 19th, early 20th century.
From an article by David S. Shields:
broadway.cas.sc.edu/content/collecting-theatrical-photogr...
"Austrian born Charles L. Ritzmann (1852-19??), whose gallery occupied 943 Broadway, began collecting celebrity photographs, including theatrical portraits, in the mid-1870s. Originally a dealer in “Guns, Revolvers, Rifles, Fishing Tackle, and Sporting Goods,” he converted his store into a palace of photographic celebrity in 1882. His premises imitated the great galleries of Gurney and Brady during the first age of commercial photography in New York. Yet since the creation of images was subordinate to the display and sale of every available image by every producer of imagery of every royal, politician, author, or performer of the age, the scope of Ritzmann’s collection far exceeded that of any other publically accessible. In 1887, for instance, it contained “350 different poses of Ellen Terry and more than 250 of Mrs. Langtry.”[30] In the following year he scored a singular coup, purchasing the surviving stock of Jose Maria Mora when that photographer went bankrupt. An observer remarked, “the unwary person who drops in to buy one picture remains a slave to many.”[31] Ritzmann issued celebrity photographs under his own brand under the late 1880s. He did not take these pictures himself; indeed some were rebranded images from other photographers whose stocks he cannibalized. Others were taken by anonymous operators. His photographic sitting room operated at a second premises 171 ½ Broadway. Ritzmann’s own fascinations in the 1890s tended toward New York real estate. Eventually he moved his gallery to 228 Fifth Avenue where it resided during the first decade of the twentieth century. Jerome Banning supplied an illustrated narrative account of going through the collection in a piece entitled “New York’s Museum of Photography”[32] He was generally reckoned the greatest retailer of celebrity photographs in New York City in the Gilded age and during the first decades of the twentieth century. When the direct retail sale of portraits diminished with the rise of the illustrated magazines, Ritzmann altered his business model, becoming an image brokerage supplying those magazines. He retired shortly after 1920 and a substantial portion of his stock appears to have been absorbed into the Culver Service collection at that time."
(Thank you to Clelia Conti for the info.)