Goodwin Glass Plate Negatives – Research Conclusions/Summary

[Joe_G.]

Warning, what began as merely some notes on the airplane ride back from Saco River Auction grew to what you see here, not for those with a passing interest.

The January 14th Saco River Auction offering of 46 “Vermont Find” negatives was cause for great excitement for many of us who collect Old Judge cards. For others, anything relating to the “Vermont Find” is cause to be suspicious and steer clear. I believe the later viewpoint is due to the fact that some, perhaps all, of the Vermont Find prints/photos are not period pieces (post Old Judge production) and has undeservedly tainted the view of the negatives. The Vermont Find is discussed in the book “Photographic Baseball Cards of Goodwin & Co.” and chronicles a viewpoint that remains accurate. However, now that another 46 negatives have surfaced we have more proof that the negatives themselves are original and used by Goodwin & Co. to make the N172/N175 and N173 cards we cherish today.

Are the Vermont Find negatives authentic, utilized by Goodwin & Co. to make cards?

Yes, the negatives are the very examples Goodwin & Co. used to make N172/N175 and N173 cards. To support this position I submit one example of Stump Weidman, pose 483-2. I’ve posted a scan of the negative, a positive (inverted the negative colors) and the N173 of the same pose. The glass plate negative has lost some of the ink writing over the years (likely due to an ill-advised cleaning with solvent) but you can still see the writing at bottom that reads “Weidman, P. New York” just as it appears on the N173 cabinet together with the 1887 Goodwin & Co. copyright to the left of his legs. The arch on Weidman’s chest has received serious alteration to update the jersey from “DETROIT” to “NEW YORK” (or more accurately, from “TROIT” to “YORK”). Again, the solvent has washed away most of the “YORK” but evidence remains on the negative that matches the N173 (see close-up).

I do welcome alternate theories so feel free to offer yours. Just consider that all the negatives show far more detail and real estate (area surrounding player) than any of the cards they helped produce. We can clearly see alterations to the negatives that then show up in the cards produced for/by Goodwin & Co. These alterations are not merely similar to what is found on the cards, but instead exact matches.

Chronological history of a negative (continuing with Stump Weidman, 483-2, as an example)

Stump Weidman and most of his Detroit teammates would visit Gray Studio in spring of 1887 to be photographed for Goodwin & Company. Gray Studio did not originally write the player’s name, position, and team nor the copyright directly on the negative in ink but instead listed some details in tape around the perimeter/border of the negative. Goodwin would first use this negative to issue Stump’s 1887 N172 and then could have also produced an N175 (although not catalogued for Stump). To understand how a small card could be produced from a 5”x7” negative, I refer you to the Old Judge book already referenced (see chapter dedicated to card production process). The 1888 season would find Weidman with the New York Giants and a couple of his negatives, including the one posted here, were updated to reflect the team change. The notes written on the pieces of tape at the top border are updated to reflect the team change. The negative itself was likewise updated with “DETROIT” being scratched off Weidman’s uniform leaving only a clear glass arch across Weidman’s chest and then “YORK” added in black ink. On a positive/print, this appears as a black arched band with white lettering. If Weidman were issued an 1888 N172, it would show these modifications. And by the time the cabinets were offered later in 1888, the players name, position, and team were added together with the copyright as shown on the N173 above. The 1888 cabinet would be the last card for Stump as his career was over and the negative remains as it was last used in 1888 albeit a little worse for wear with some of the inked alterations partially removed.

A similar history could be told for each negative, others received little attention, others more.

How many negatives are known to exist within the hobby, which players, which poses?

I’ve updated my list that originally chronicled the negatives once owned by Terry Knouse Sr. & Jr. (TIK & TIK, many of which they still have). TIK & TIK had 42 negatives at one time and the latest offering from Saco River brings the total to at least 88 negatives. They are split between 28 players which is still a small sampling of 2500+ poses from 522 players issued N172 cards. This total of 88 negatives exceeds what I’ve been able to catalogue below as some of the earliest sales were not documented. There is a nice mix of players, Leagues (NL, AA, & WA), teams / Studios who photographed these teams, and poses including a pair of portraits, some two player negatives, and the more typical batting, pitching/throwing, and catching variants. The Vermont Find negatives that Saco River auctioned (highlighted in blue) add poses to players already catalogued as having a negative as well as introducing some new players such as Doran and others. It is also worth noting that all Vermont Find prints/photos, whether they are period or otherwise, originate from these negatives.





Other Observations

Negative Numbering - Many of the negatives originated from Gray Studio in 1887 and they numbered their negatives. For example, all four negatives of Stump Weidman are numbered #1846 (written on tape at border as seen on example attached above). The numbers appear to track the order each team and player was photographed. The following can be observed:

Boston: #1665 for Burdock
Washington: #1700 for Farrell
Pittsburgh: #1742 for McKinnon
Indianapolis: #1781 for Arundel, #1782 for Cahill, and #1787 for Corcoran
Detroit: #1846 for Weidman

This matches the order in which Goodwin & Co. issued the zero numbered cards (1887 cards); Boston largely before Washington before Pittsburgh followed by Indy and finally Detroit, the final NL team. Goodwin likely assembled the 1887 zero numbered cards as they received negatives from the Studio. On a per team basis, however, Goodwin didn’t order the Indy players according to the negative numbers.

Other studios numbered their negatives but differently than Gray Studio. Gilbert & Bacon, Kensington, and Walzl's Imperial Portraits didn’t reserve the same number for a given player but instead incremented for each negative. Boyce, Harkins, Mathews, O’Brien, and Whitacre are all examples with multiple negatives/poses per player with sequential numbers (instead of same numbers). Other studios didn’t appear to assign a number to the negatives at all.

Two Negatives of Same Pose? – Too early to say, I need better scans, but there appears to be two negatives of Bobby Matthews that are either very similar (shot back-to-back) or the same (two cameras at same time?). There is proof that the negatives are not mere copies of each other as both contain different background details but the captured player pose looks the same. I’ll comment further when I have better scans (they are forthcoming).

Why is 1889 Underrepresented? – A quick study of the list above shows all but one player, Egyptian Healy, dates to 1887 or 1888 photo shoots and a deeper probe shows most negatives were not used to issue cards beyond 1888. This is strange when you consider how far reaching the 1889 Old Judge card issue was with an abundance of both new players and re-issues from previous years. Out of this grouping of negatives, Healy is the only one with an 1889 negative and O’Connell is the only other player with a negative used to make cards beyond 1888 (1888 negatives were used to make cards with Omaha in 1888 then updated to reflect 1889 team change with Des Moines). I have no good explanation for the near absence of 1889 negative usage.

Uncatalogued Poses – A full ¼ of the negatives (21/84) are uncatalogued poses; i.e. not known in card form. This was a surprisingly high number to me. Some of these poses belong to extremely scarce players such as Flynn in which case the cards that may have once existed have been lost to time (or still waiting to be discovered). Others belong to less difficult players like Moffet, but even common players can have difficult poses. Regardless, it is hard to believe that all these uncatalogued poses were used by Goodwin & Co. to create cards. In some cases, I believe the card producer only selected certain negatives/poses, perhaps their favorites, during the production process. There are quite a few examples of players such as Collins and Gerhardt, who were issued some cards in one year (1887) and then new poses surface a year later (1888) from the same original photoshoot (1887). It is not hard to imagine some of these negatives that are not used the first year may have also been passed on in subsequent years and account for some of the uncatalogued negatives. But the existence of these uncatalogued negatives suggests the total N172 pose count could be far greater than ~2500. Some of the uncatalogued poses are real neat; I’d love to see them surface as cards.

Negative Thickness – One of the first items I noticed while studying the negatives was the variation in glass thickness. Some negatives were heavier than others and prompted me to seek out a pair of calipers. I took multiple measures on each negative as permitted by Saco River to document min, max, and average thickness. The overall average came in at 1.96mm with the thinnest negative coming in at 1.45mm average and the thickest at 2.75mm average. They all had a taper in a somewhat random direction with an extreme case of nearly a full millimeter (2.04mm at top, 3.02mm at bottom). Beyond that, there were many subtle peaks and valleys. I couldn’t find any correlation between glass thickness and image quality with only slight deltas from one studio to the next. I believe the significant variation is a simple artifact of Studios using run of the mill, cheap, low-grade glass. After all, it appears to have worked just fine.

Negative Image Quality – All photographers were not equal. Some worked with better equipment than others, some had more experience, and others had more patience to make the most of every shot. Some of the responsibility also falls on the ball player and ambient lighting. While photography was “instantaneous” (fractions of a second) by 1887, it was still important for the subject being photographed to remain still for a high quality image. Sufficient lighting was also important to keep exposure time down. Focusing a camera was a very manual process with many opportunities for some, or all, of the player to fall out of focus by varying degrees. I quickly appreciated those negatives that provided crystal clear images of the player. Gilbert & Bacon received my highest marks with nearly every shot of Bobby Mathews being unbelievably clear. Gray Studio also consistently scored high marks while others didn’t. Fearnaught, for example, often had better focus on the backdrop and even the wall behind the backdrop than the player who appears a bit blurry. Others were even worse but even the worst negatives can make great looking N172 card due to their small size. A larger cabinet on the other hand is more discriminating/revealing. I will post some scans when I have my negatives in hand, both the good and not so good.

Not commented on here is the fact that some negatives are lighter and darker than others. For the most part, this Saco River group of negatives exhibited good contrast albeit some on the darker side (longer exposure) and others on the lighter side (shorter exposure). A good looking print can be made from both dark and light negatives; they simply have different time requirements (light exposure) to create a high quality positive.

In Closing – I’d like to summarize the significance of these negatives and their miraculous journey to present day. To call them merely N173 negatives would be under-selling them. These negatives are responsible for all variants of the pose they represent, i.e. N172/N175 and N173. Their image quality surpasses all prints/photos created from them. They chronicle photography from across America during the late 1880s, all sent to the card maker, sometimes modified over the production run of N172/N175 and N173, and somehow surviving to present day. Early glass plate negatives, unlike the photos/cards produced from them, were not a popular collectable and few examples were saved. I’m still hoping more details will be brought to light by the consignor of the latest offering (a standing request left with Saco River). As Jay Miller said in another post, “these negatives are about as historically significant an Old Judge item as you can get”. I understand not wanting to collect something so fragile (likely to be locked up and rarely enjoyed directly), but the historical significance is off the charts. I wish I could have afforded the whole lot, but that would just be downright greedy.

Thank You! – Many thanks to Terry Knouse Sr., Shirley Knouse, and son Terry Knouse Jr. (TIK & TIK) for their support back in 2008 as we were writing the book and again more recently to discuss the Saco River offering. They have some other odds and ends from the Vermont Find that they will be sharing that might shed further light on the many questions that remain. I also want to thank the Saco River Auction staff. Thank you Troy, thank you Dave, and thank you Jacob for providing me with first class access to the negatives over my two day stay. Each of the 46 negatives were handled by staff as I studied them in a number of areas including measuring each and every one for thickness (min, max, mean etc.). Not that this was the most important inspection, but gives you an idea of how accommodating they were to each and every request despite knowing I wasn't the deep pocketed buyer all auction houses yearn for.

[Fred]

In a word - "Wow"

[edjs]

Joe,

Great read, thanks for sharing this wealth of information. Terry is an awesome guy, he sent me an e-mail straight from the last National because he found a great Pinkerton Cabinet he thought I would need (unfortunately I was tapped out at the time). I am attaching a pic from my collection, which I hope is from the Vermont find. I hope you like it as much as I do.

Ed

[brass_rat]

Thank you very much for posting this hard work, Joe. I really enjoyed reading it!

Best regards,
Steve

[vthobby]

Deleted

[Al C.risafulli]

Fascinating, Joe. Great research. Thanks for sharing it with us all.

-Al

[oldjudge]

As is always true of Joe's work, research of the highest quality. Great job my friend.

[h2oya311]

Fascinating! Joe - Thanks for sharing your research with us!

[vwtdi]

Well thought out and well done Joe. Very interesting read, loved it.

[barrysloate]

Great research Joe. This thread should saved in the Net54 Forum Archive.

[Leon]

Originally Posted by barrysloate

Great research Joe. This thread should saved in the Net54 Forum Archive.

Great job Joe. Yes, we will have it archived permanently in our archive section. (as long as Joe is ok with it)

[shernan30]

Great work Joe, thanks.

[Jacklitsch]

I think this may be a print from the Vermont find. Boyce

[ullmandds]

nice work Joe...apparently the sale was a unique opportunity to acquire some incredibly important artifacts. Congrats!

[kkkkandp]

Joe's writeup seems to indicate there should be images in it.

Am I the only one that doesn't see them?

[jcmtiger]

Nice job Joe, lots of good info on some rare pieces. Great write up as usual by
an expert in the field.

Joe

[Joe_G.]

Thanks for all the positive feedback, much of it left before the pictures were appearing. Thank you Kevin for noting that they were not showing up and getting ahold of me. They were linked from my Net54 album which I had marked as private (oops). Discussing negatives is a difficult subject matter and I can't imagine following my text without the images.

Thanks to those who posted their Vermont Find prints. Flynn and Doran seem to be the most common subjects but I've also seen Allen, Boyce, Burns, Farrell, Wilson, and Whitacre.

From the list of negatives, there are some real interesting poses. The negative I'd like to see most (not yet studied) is that which purportedly shows Healy and Mathews (2 player). This could have been from one of three photo shoots; 1887 when Egyptian Healy was photographed with Indy (Gray Studio), 1888 when Mathews was photographed with Philadelphia (Gilbert & Bacon), or 1889 when Healy was again photographed but now with Washington (Merritt & Van Wagner). 1887 would be the least likely while both the 1888 and 1889 photo shoots are strong possibilities. Regardless of when, it is interesting to see two players on a card that didn't play with one another. Mathews was retired after the 1887 season but that didn't stop Goodwin & Co. from issuing his cards in 1888. He was well known for not only his amazing pitching capabilities (remains a HOF hopeful) but for his small stature (5'-5", 140lbs). Egyptian Healy on the other hand was amongst the tallest in the League at 6'-2". This could make for the second coming of "Long & Short" (Nicol & Reilly).

At any rate, I do intend to bump this thread once I have my negatives in hand (couple weeks?). I expect to be able to post some mind-blowing clear images of Bobby Mathews. The Weidman I posted above is pretty well focused but the Mathews was clearly superior.

And for the record, here is what the Weidman image looked like before the negative was modified to show his move to New York.

[uffda51]

Great work, Joe! Bravo.

[ethicsprof]

Phenomenal contribution to the field!
many thanks

best,
barry

[autograf]

I don't collect them as much anymore but really enjoy seeing this type of research and illumination on the set. Thanks for your efforts......

[t206blogcom]

Fantastic post!

[Joe_G.]

Bump . . .

For a number of reasons, it has taken awhile for me to take delivery of the negatives I won at the Saco River Auctions, but they are now in-hand safe and sound. I want to begin by thanking the team at Chicago Albumen Works including Doug Munson, Toddy Munson, and Emily Phoenix who assisted with negative cleaning, scanning, creating a “back-up” LVT negative, creating prints, and providing archival storage materials and advice for safe keeping for the next 100 years. They likewise provided a good resource to help explain some of their observations made on various negatives such as the presence of varnish on some. Visit the following webpage from the Image Permanence Institute for far more details on 19th century negatives than I have provided.

Everything you wanted to know about Gelatin Dry Plates and more.

Among my winnings, a pair of Weidmans, a Moffett, and a pair of Matthews. I really cherish the Stump Weidman negatives since they date to the 1887 Detroit Wolverine photo shoot. Weidman is the only Detroit Wolverine player found amongst the known population of negatives. In my original post I shared all the modifications performed on one of the Weidman negatives and how it proves the negatives are original to the card making process. On a side note, one of Weidman negatives provides some clues on the bat’s maker but eludes my limited knowledge on the subject. Is anyone here able to identify the bat’s make/type? I had much better luck with Matthews, but more on that later.

The Moffett negative dates to an 1888 photoshoot at Fearnaught Studio. Fearnaught photographed both the Indy and Detroit teams before the start of the 1888 baseball season with Moffett’s negative providing some insight into why some of the player’s cards (especially N173s) contain a leg of the backdrop stand; i.e. a narrow backdrop. See N173 examples of Pete Conway (not mine) & Deacon White. In studying the Moffett negatives it becomes apparent that the optic focal plane is excellent at the bottom (feet) but falls behind the player as you move up to chest and face (blurry). Nice photo of front shoe, not so much for his face.

Last, but not least, the images Gilbert and Bacon captured of HOF hopeful Bobby Matthews. As previously mentioned, the Gilbert & Bacon negatives enjoy some of the best image clarity I’ve studied. I’m posting the complete negatives together with enlarged images (limited to 600x600).

Perhaps the biggest surprise from studying all the negatives at the Saco River Auction originate from the Bobby Matthews images in which he was handling a very early Louisville Slugger bat. I’m told that this 1888 image predates any other known professional model Hillerich bat in print, photo, or actual surviving bat by approximately a decade. As the legend goes, the first professional model Hillerich bat was used by Pete Browning in 1884 and wouldn’t become commonplace until much later (Louisville Slugger being patented in 1894). On the bat you can clearly make out the proper address for Hillerich’s wood shop, 216 FIRST ST, LOUISVILLE, KY which today is 118S 1st St (home to Hillerich’s shop from 1875-1901). I just wish the bat were rotated a bit so we could see what was printed on the bat above the address. It almost looks like it might say “J F HILLERICH & SON” (bottom bat - from "bat at side" pose) but I have conflicting information from HOF, Louisville Slugger Museum, and Net54 members as to when this would have been possible. Some suggest this wasn’t possible until 1897 yet there is literature dated 1895 that uses “J F HILLERICH & SON”. Others suggest this could have been used as early as 1887. The son, John Andrew "Bud" Hillerich, was working for his father, J. Frederick Hillerich, as an apprentice as early as 1880 but not sure when the father renamed the business J F Hillerich & Son.

Without further ado, here is the earliest known image of a professional model bat from the Hillerich family.

[trdcrdkid]

Joe -- the first word on Weidman's bat is "Burlingame", but I can't make out the second word. I gather that Burlingame was a popular bat model in the 1880s, and replicas are used today by vintage base ball recreators:

http://providencegrays.pbworks.com/w...rlingame%20Bat

https://www.phoenixbats.com/burlinga...eball-bat.html

[wonkaticket]

Joe, one of the most interesting things I have read in a long time. Wow just wow and an amazing job. Add in the fact that used one of my fav poses from the OJ and that's the icing on the cake.



Great post.

Cheers,

John

[kkkkandp]

Joe:

Thanks to you for one of my favorite Net 54 threads of all time!

Kevin

[ullmandds]

Awesome stuff Joe!

[wolf441]

Very impressive. Some really great research to add to our hobby, Joe!!

[T206Collector]

Crazy awesome

[autograf]

Top 10 threads ever and fantastic research. Makes me want to get back into the OJ world again........

[kkkkandp]

Joe:

For what it is worth, the bat that Arundel is holding on my negative is also a Burlingame.

Kevin

[baseball tourist]

Great stuff!

[Joe_G.]

Originally Posted by trdcrdkid

Joe -- the first word on Weidman's bat is "Burlingame", but I can't make out the second word.

Dave, thanks for the spot on lead. The more I dig into baseball bat history the more intrigued I've become. I previously thought professional model bats of the 1880s were nearly all Spalding or Reach but now realize there were many more possibilities.

Kevin, thanks for the post on Arundel using a Burlingame bat. It actually appears to be the same bat for both photo shoots at Gray Studio suggesting that it was perhaps a prop owned by Gray Studio. Can you check and see if there is a small chip in the knob of the bat found slightly above a line that extends down center of bat positioned above the "BURLINGAME" logo?

There is evidence that players were loyal to certain bats yet when the team would be photographed they would often use another bat. Example being Charlie Bennett who was known to like A J Reach bats (see 1886 Reach Guide below, middle of page), yet when photographed at Tomlinson Studio in 1886, Bennett used the same Spalding bat as all the other Detroit players. This Spalding bat may have belonged to the team, another player, or Tomlinson Studio.

I guess this could also mean the early Hillerich Louisville bat may have been used by teammates during the Athletics photo shoot but could be tough to determine from surviving cards.

Thanks to everyone for chiming in, these negatives are pretty neat pieces of history. I'm still amazed at the detail the old manually operated wood & brass cameras could capture on a coated glass plate. Here is another close-up, this time of Matthew's belt.

I just now realized that I inadvertently posted two historic players in the same post when I coupled Deacon White with Bobby Matthews. They both played in the first ever MLB game in 1871. Bobby Matthews was the starting and winning pitcher despite Deacon White having a solid performance including a stand-up double to lead off the game (first MLB hit). By the time Goodwin & Co. issued their cards they were "OLD" men.

Keep an eye out for this OJ (sorry, rushed attempt to create what could be / may be).

[oldjudge]

Interesting that Anson endorsed the Reach bat. That couldn't have made Big Al happy.

[kkkkandp]

Joe:

You've done it again!

It is impossible to say for certain that (pardon my French ) there is an imperfection on Arundel's knob. The position of the bat, the proximity of his hands to the end of the bat, and the focus prevents that. The imperfection is fairly evident, however, on Cahill's (Arundel's Indianapolis teammate) negative. That would seem to corroborate your supposition that the bat was the same one used in several photo shoots.

Kevin

Arundel first; then Cahill

[barrysloate]

Originally Posted by autograf

Top 10 threads ever and fantastic research. Makes me want to get back into the OJ world again........

+1

Down the road, when we are discussing the best Net54 threads of all time, let's all of us keep this one in mind. This thread is like a college research paper.

[jcmtiger]

Joe G. is the most detailed collector I have ever met. Especially with this 19th Century stuff. He was the guy that helped me understand the Detroit players and I was able to collect all poses of the 1887 Detroit team because of his input.

Thanks Joe G

[bmarlowe1]

Originally Posted by kkkkandp

Joe:
It is impossible to say for certain that (pardon my French ) there is an imperfection on Arundel's knob.

It may be possible to do some wood grain comparisons on other portions of the bat, though this is also subject to focus and how the bat has been rotated in the respective photos.

[Runscott]

Joe, I can't see any of the pictures - there's a blank space where each image should appear.

I 'quoted' your post so that I could see the 'IMG' text, copied the url into a separate browser window, and they still each come up blank.

[wolf441]

Originally Posted by Runscott

Joe, I can't see any of the pictures - there's a blank space where each image should appear.

I 'quoted' your post so that I could see the 'IMG' text, copied the url into a separate browser window, and they still each come up blank.

Looks fine on my page. I think they call that a PEBCAT in the IT world....

"problem exists between chair and terminal"

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by wolf441

Looks fine on my page. I think they call that a PEBCAT in the IT world....

"problem exists between chair and terminal"

It is a Safari issue. Works fine with Firefox browser.


Joe - those images and your research are incredible!!!!

[Joe_G.]

John, let me know when you are ready to downgrade that Weidman, I have you covered

Kevin, thanks for the follow-up on Arundel’s knob

Apparently it was common for players to pass the bat and in this case probably a studio prop that was used player after player, team after team. Per details outlined in the original post, I believe Boston was the first team photographed by Gray Studio in 1887. Burdock, Tate and others have a different bat with a dark ring at the end (which could be a Burlingame bat - they had models with ring at end, but different than the Burlingame bat we see in our negatives). All the teams that would follow Boston (Philadelphia, Washington, Pittsburgh, New York, Indianapolis, Chicago, and Detroit) could very well be using the same Burlingame bat we see on the 1887 Indy and Detroit negatives. Consider that none of players from the mentioned teams are using the commonplace Spalding or Reach bats (easy to identify). That Burlingame bat may be the most photographed baseball bat in the history of baseball cards (Gray Studio has far more poses in OJ set than any other Studio). Jump to Fearnaught studio in 1888 and all Detroits (5 players) as well as the 1888 Indy photos have what appears to be the same Spalding ring bat. Start looking at specific team photo shoots within OJ set and you see the bat trend time and time again.

Jay, I bet Spalding was not happy with Anson’s endorsement of Reach bats and may have contributed to his aggressive takeover of the company in the years that followed. Then again, Spalding purchased many of his competitors, not just Reach. I think Baby Anson enjoyed rubbing more than just the umpire and opposing players the wrong way. That had to be awkward to play for Chicago and not swing a Spalding bat in those years. I find it equally surprising that Spalding didn't have the foresight to request his team to bring a Spalding ring bat to Gray Studio in 1887; they all appear to be posing with the Burlingame bat.

I posted the following image on the Memorabilia side and figured I'd post it here as well. I believe this 1888 (or earlier) Hillerich bat reads:

J F HILLERICH & SON
216 FIRST ST.
LOUISVILLE, KY.

Enough about bats . . .

For those who have or desire to collect negatives, Goodwin & Co. or otherwise, I will again give props to Chicago Albumen Works who offer just about any service you could want. In my case that included a light cleaning, scanning (1200dpi), making back-up LVT negatives (modern high quality flimsy negative to preserve the image if the unthinkable happens to the glass negative), prints (sepia toned in my case), providing me with several digital options on CD, and the all important archival storage materials (box holds up to a dozen 5”x7” negatives). Chicago Albumen Works is not cheap, but good help usually isn’t. I’ve attached a couple pictures for those who might be curious.

Note that the four flap envelope is preferred to avoid sliding the negative in and out of envelopes such as the glassine envelopes that can be seen at bottom right. The glassine envelopes may actually be original to the negatives but are not the best way to store them. I'm saving the envelopes but the negatives will no longer call them home.

Thank you to everyone that has responded here and in personal emails. I'm elated to share with my hobby friends, we all share a common interest and feed off each other.

[GoldenAge50s]

What a tremendous read & education!

Thanks Joe--Outstanding piece of work!