1. "The Daguerreian Society"
Posted by kimberly on Mar-2nd-03 at 1:08 PM

I love antique photographs & The Daguerreian Society has
a lot of very beautiful old daguerreotype's on their website:
http://www.daguerre.org/home.html. This is one of my favorites,
hope you all enjoy!

Thanks, Kimberly.  What a cool site.  I used to collect Victorian photos, sold my collection, though I still enjoy looking at them. 

A few months ago, I was at an antique show in Richmond, and one of the dealers had a book for sale called (I think), "Beautiful Dreamers."  It's a book of posthumous photographs.  As the title suggests, some of them are quite beautiful, especially those of children.  The book was over $200, so I wasn't tempted to buy it, but I did find it fascinating.  Alas, the death of a child was something almost all families suffered in Victorian times, and often the family didn't have a picture of the deceased, so one was taken after death.  Of course, many of the pictures are of older family members too.  I'm also amused to see that many of the subjects don't seem to be dead at all!  (A post-mortem photo sells for much more than one of a live subject, it seems.)  I almost hate to admit something so morbid interests me, but I've taken to searching on "Post Mortem" (or spell it "Postmortem") on eBay periodically, just to look at the selection available. I haven't bought any, nor do I intend to, but they can certainly provide a window into life in those times.  A good many of those sold on eBay are Daguerreotypes, although some are the result of more modern processes.

I don't think it is morbid at all -- they aren't really
"gore" they were always tastefully done & show such love --
the babies seemed to have been so cherished, I can see
why people hated to let them go entirely & not have any
photographs at all. I have seen several of adults too --
but they don't have the same look that the post mortem
children & babies have -- they usually do just look asleep.