At the end of World War II Ansco had some of the leading scientists and engineers in the photographic area. They stood even with Eastman Kodak in the professional markets. They were proud of their heritage from the Anthony company. It is somewhat hazy where all of these "original" Brady plates came from, but the illustration on the left appeared in early 1953. Ansco promoted these images in travel displays and made huge poster-sized enlargements. There were several sets of Brady negatives, one of which was sold to the Anthony company in settlement of debt, but the story of what became of them, are not clear to me. Remember, that the Brady studios were very good at making duplicate negatives, or copies of retouched prints.

I was told that the original plates were later sent to the National Gallery, but that Ansco retained the duplicate negatives, and diapositives in their files. Ansco had a huge collection of films, used in their advertising and promotion, and I have often wondered what became of them when the company ceased to exist as an active photographic manufacturer.

The "wet plate" negatives were very difficult to print with top quality due to the great density range between dark and light in the plate. The early lenses were of outstanding quality, and the process yielded virtually grainless results, thus the amount of information locked into the plates was vast.

Ansco's technique in their laboratory involved use of a 'point light source' for
brilliant sharpness, and producing by contact a low contrast intermediate, positive film (diapositive) on specially made process film which was then developed using the most exacting controls of densitometry. They were likely the most advanced scientists in this field that had ever existed. An interesting side comment is that the Brady studios were experts too in making duplicate or copy negatives from a retouched print original - - about which more will be said. (See how the original "wet plate" negatives were prepared.)

The end result were prints showing a total range, sharpness and detail that had never before been viewed in Civil War Photography, and which fully matched that of modern photographic film. I have attempted to scan some of these images using digital techiques. (you can see a higher resolution image on some). I hope the screen resolution you can view on this computer gives some indication of the quality contained in these prints.

For years I have studied these prints, compared them with those appearing in the National Gallery, and historical publications......I have always been amazed at the information contained.

I also then decided to make a trip - - to revisit some of the battlefields -- to try and
locate some of the scenes found in these amazing prints.

Brady employed photographers, collected photos, and
took many of his own photos under dangerous conditions

Civil War band music courtesy Library of Congress