Ordering Prints From The Collection

(Scroll down to the bottom of this page to see an example of an original scan and a cleaned version of the same photograph.)

The Library’s collection of artistically and historically significant photographs, now numbering more than 5,000, mostly taken between 1890 and 1958, is housed in The Weaver Photography Archive Room, a gift to the Library from Miles W. Weaver at the time of the 2000 addition.

Much of the collection consists of work done by the early Illuminist, Henry Lathrop Rand, 1862 - 1945, Dr. George A. Neal, 1872 - 1939, and Willis H. Ballard, 1906 - 1980, plus Charles Townsend, Bryant Bradley and unknown photographers. The Library is also the repository of the Henry R. Hinckley Company photographs.

The images are primarily of Mount Desert Island, the Maine coast and its inhabitants, although such areas as Gloucester and Magnolia, Massachusetts and Baddeck, Nova Scotia are represented.

The collection includes:
Photographs of early inhabitants of Southwest Harbor - their houses, industries and businesses,
schools and the Library,
early fishing and boat building,
hotels,
sailboats, schooners and steam vessels,
garages and automobiles,
Indians,
views of Southwest Harbor, Manset, Tremont, Northeast Harbor, Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park.

We scan each photograph at high resolution, save the original scan, remove minor blemishes on a second copy and have them printed to order on matte paper by a professional laboratory.

High-definition copies, without watermarks, of the original scans or those we have cleaned may be purchased from the Library.

We are working on a digitized pictorial database to enable the public to see and read about the photographs and hope to have it available early in 2008. The photographs may now be viewed, by appointment, at the library.

For more information, return to the Library Home Page from the CLICK HERE at the top of this page. From the Home Page CLICK on ABOUT THE LIBRARY button, then CLICK on THE COLLECTION OF HISTORIC PHOTOGRAPHS and look for the CLICK HERE to download an order form that includes a price list for copies and list of archive policies. (And yes, we hope to have an easier way to get there from this page soon!)