The Photographers

The Photographers

We are the beneficiaries of their entrepreneurial vision to collect and preserve memories for future generations.

Roy Tuley (far left), with two other photographers. Their cameras are likely the Graflex Anniversary Speed Graphic - often noted as the most famous 'press camera'.

Roy Tuley
(1916-1975)

The daughters of Roy Tuley have digitally donated some amazing images taken by their father. He was a photographer for the Nashville Banner, and later at the Chattanooga Times beginning in the 1940s. He established his own freelance business and was a well-known private photographer around Chattanooga in the 50s and 60s. His name appears as photo credit on many postcards of the era as well. Like most professional photographers at that time, he used a 'medium format' camera. The word medium is misleading here, because the negatives are 5 x 4 inches each, or approximately 15 times larger than 35mm film. The results are apparent in the amazing details.

Roy (left) with unidentified man on Signal Mountain.
This one box held many 4x5" negatives, digitally donated by his family for all to enjoy. Their generous actions ensure Tuley's photographic legacy lives on.

 


Kingsport(TN)Times, Sun, Jan 21, 1940

Will Stokes
(1866-1922)

Amos W. Judd
(1845-1929)

A W Judd's name is often seen on cabinet card photos of his era. His name and studio appears in Chattanooga’s business directories from 1890 through 1920.

George N. Barnard
(1819-1902)

He was the official photographer for the Military Division of the Mississippi commanded by Union general William T. Sherman. In the early months of 1864 Barnard photographed the landscape of East Tennessee and then worked in Nashville to create detailed topographic maps, which Sherman utilized as his troops moved from Chattanooga to Atlanta.
 Link to more info on Barnard.

Mathew Brady
(1822-1896)

Brady and his photographers are well known for capturing thousands of glass plate images during the US Civil War.

Brady spent over $100,000 to create over 10,000 plates. He expected the U.S. government to buy the photographs when the war ended, but when the government refused to do so, he was forced to sell his New York City studio and go into bankruptcy. Congress granted Brady $25,000 in 1875, but he remained deeply in debt.

Depressed by his financial situation, loss of eyesight and devastated by the death of his wife in 1887, he became very lonely. He died penniless in the charity ward of Presbyterian Hospital in New York City on January 15, 1896 from complications following a streetcar accident. Link to more info on Brady.

"No one will ever know what I went through to secure those negatives. The world can never appreciate it. It changed the whole course of my life."
-Mathew Brady

William Henry Jackson
(1843-1942)

In 1866 Jackson boarded a Union Pacific railroad and traveled until it reached the end of the line at that time, about one hundred miles west of Omaha, Nebraska, where he then joined a wagon train heading west to Great Salt Lake. In 1869 Jackson won a commission from the Union Pacific Railroad to document the scenery along the various railroad routes for promotional purposes. When his work was discovered by Ferdinand Hayden who was organizing a geological survey to explore the Yellowstone region, he was asked to join the expedition.
  Link to more info on Jackson.