Visual Materials
This collection contains 269 stereographs by photographer Carleton E. Watkins, dating from the 1860s to about the 1880s, that chiefly depict buildings, points of interest, and locales in Northern and Southern California. The collection includes 1 stereograph from the Central Pacific Railroad series; 5 stereographs from Watkins' Pacific Railroad Series; 110 stereographs from Watkins' Pacific Coast series; and 150 stereographs from Watkins' New Series. The Watkins' Pacific Coast Series, created between 1861 and 1874, primarily depict locales in Northern California with many images of buildings in San Francisco, views of Yosemite and Mariposa County, Missions, and some mining operations including photographs of the North Bloomfield Gravel Mining Company in Nevada County, California. The Watkins' New Series stereographs, created between 1874 and 1890, consist of images of both Southern California and Northern California, in cities including San Francisco, Pasadena, San Marino, Sierra Madre, and San Gabriel. Among the Southern California residences and properties depicted include the Sunny Slope Ranch of L.J. Rose in San Gabriel, Willow Dale owned by N.C. Carter, and Lake Vineyard owned by B.D. Wilson. Some of the stereographs in Watkins' Pacific Coast Series include titles in the margins in Watkins' own hand (see Nos. 1033, 1135, 1146, 1153, and 1721). Numbered captions with printed titles appear on many of the mounts; unnumbered mounts are numbered consecutively within the series beginning at 1. Item titles chiefly transcribed from printed titles in stereograph margin; cataloger devised titles are enclosed in square brackets.
photST Watkins
