4 10 101 https://mirrorofrace.bc.edu/files/original/07bdcfb10554e5e8137cff2c2ef8f91e.tif 248a1fe60b2ebfb2a22f655abe3ccf02 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Mirror of Race Subject The topic of the resource Mirror of Race Main Collection Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data tintype Physical Dimensions The actual physical size of the original image Half Plate (4.25 x 5.5 inches) Factual Commentary Factual Commentary The African American man in the center of this photograph holds a large Remington revolver, probably of Civil War vintage, although this image is from later in the century. Unfortunately, we know nothing more about the identities of these men or the circumstances of the photograph. Interpretive Commentary Interpretive Commentary This enigmatic photograph raises many questions. What are these three white men doing with the one black man? Why is the African American man displaying a revolver, and why is he the only one armed, a reversal of the usual power dynamic between the races in the period? The white men seem to be friendly with the black one ― the man at the right with a cigar smiles broadly and has his arm over the the central figure’s shoulder, and he seems to be smiling, too. But there is also something menacing about the pose: the white men surround and hem in the black man, and the man at the right seems more to be leering than embracing him. Perhaps the joke is a cruel one: a sarcastic reversal of the power dynamic that is just that ― a joke. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Figure041 Title A name given to the resource four men and a revolver Subject The topic of the resource unknown Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource circa 1885 Type The nature or genre of the resource studio portrait Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Greg French Collection Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Photographer Photographer https://mirrorofrace.bc.edu/files/original/37155faf5d6d2a6fc7737f90a6f1aa7c.tif 589f4e0b92263015d46a1ad2aa430b39 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Mirror of Race Subject The topic of the resource Mirror of Race Main Collection Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data carte de visite: albumen print Physical Dimensions The actual physical size of the original image cdv standard Factual Commentary Factual Commentary We do not know who the child or the woman in this photograph were, or where it was taken; however, the woman wears traditional Chinese clothing. Tens of thousands of Chinese immigrated to the United States after the Gold Rush to California of the late 1840s. It is likely that a white family employed this woman as a minder for their child. Interpretive Commentary Interpretive Commentary One of the ways that the races of the 19th century mixed most closely was in the domestic world of child care. For rich white families, it was a mark of status and success to be able to employ a person of another race as a domestic servant, for this both declared their wealth and served as a way to distinguish whiteness from the supposedly inferior social groups. And yet the intimacy of child care must have compromised this sense of distinctness and separation in many ways. The woman in this photograph seems austere, but she carefully holds the tiny, fragile toddler in her pose perched on a table, and the child seems to lean in to the woman for protection and support in what might well have been a fighting experience of staying still for the camera. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Figure034 Title A name given to the resource child on table with woman Subject The topic of the resource unknown Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource circa 1865 Type The nature or genre of the resource studio portrait Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Greg French Collection Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Photographer Photographer https://mirrorofrace.bc.edu/files/original/0956da653820c814bd080630f691bec7.tif 6147d41bd1db0c600220a3fd43cb26b6 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Mirror of Race Subject The topic of the resource Mirror of Race Main Collection Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data carte de visite: albumen print Physical Dimensions The actual physical size of the original image cdv standard Factual Commentary Factual Commentary This photograph shows Wilson Chinn, a former enslaved person, displaying implements of bondage and punishment used against slaves such as he had been. The image is one of a series of photographs produced in 1863 to lend moral support to the Union cause in the Civil War and to raise funds for schools for African Americans in the occupied Confederate territories. Chinn and seven other former slaves, both adults and children, came north for a publicity tour, accompanied by an officer from one of the newly formed regiments of African American soldiers. Chinn had been enslaved to a man named Volsey B. Marmillion, who ran a sugar plantation near New Orleans. Marmillion had the habit of branding his slaves with his initials, VBM, and this can be seen on Chinn’s forehead here ― the brand is retouched on the photography’s negatives, as it must have been hard to see (click on the image to the left for a close-up). The spiked collar would prevent a person from lying down, the leg iron would prevent running, and the perforated paddle on the floor was for beatings. The caption of this photograph reads in part: “Wilson Chinn, a branded slave from Louisiana; also exhibiting instruments of torture used to punish slaves. Photographed by Kimball, 477 Broadway, N. Y. Ent’d accord’g to act of Congress in the year 1863...” Text printed on the reverse of the card reads: “The proceeds from the sale of these Photographs will be devoted exclusively to the education of colored people in the Department of the Gulf, now under the command of Major-General Banks.” The back is also stamped: “All Orders Must Be Addressed to H. N. Bent, 1 Mercer St., N. Y.” See the enlarged illustration below. Interpretive Commentary Interpretive Commentary The series of photographs of emancipated slaves to which this one of Wilson Chinn belongs (see here for more in the series) constitutes one of the first times that mass-produced photography was used as propaganda in a campaign for a political goal. Is it fair to ask if Chinn and the other former slaves, including five children, were once again being exploited by this posing of them for the camera? Or is it more likely that having endured and escaped slavery, they were perfectly willing to lend their visible forms to this publicity campaign? If so, these photographs would embody their agency as an expression of their new-found freedom. So then would it be right to call this photograph a portrait of Wilson Chinn, in the way it is hard to call portraits the daguerreotypes of Delia, forced into the photographer’s studio to serve as an illustration for a scientific theory, or the unnamed Richards family slave? They both had no agency in how they appeared for the camera, and a “portrait” usually implies the person portrayed has some choice in how she or he is to be portrayed. Yet we also speak of “taking” someone’s portrait, and so there is a sense that we might capture the essence of a person without their knowing or against their will, as often happens in photojournalism. Would Chinn or the other emancipated slaves from New Orleans freely choose to show themselves in this way, for example in chains, as we see Chinn, if they wanted to make a portrait of themselves? Or would Chinn, like Frederick Douglass telling the story of his slavery and freedom, understand this kind of portrayal as what would in fact best tell the story of who he was and hoped to be? Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Figure033 Title A name given to the resource Wilson Chinn Subject The topic of the resource Wilson Chinn Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1863 Type The nature or genre of the resource studio portrait, social-political Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Greg French Collection Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Kimball (dates Unknown Photographer Photographer) https://mirrorofrace.bc.edu/files/original/31e2d28cac73c6b07c67abc43205a0cf.tif 1b4087648cf46ca4a6000b8e214733de Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Mirror of Race Subject The topic of the resource Mirror of Race Main Collection Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data carte de visite: albumen print Physical Dimensions The actual physical size of the original image cdv standard Factual Commentary Factual Commentary This photograph depicts two young African American men in rags. They are almost certainly “contrabands,” a name given to enslaved people who escaped from their masters once the Civil War broke out and sought refuge with the Union forces in Confederate territory. It is likely that they were photographed by an itinerant photographer at a Union army camp. Someone (almost certainly the person who purchased this image) has written on the mat in pencil: “All men are created equal” ― quoting in part perhaps the most famous line from the Declaration of Independence, namely that “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.” On the back of card (see an enlarged illustration below), the same person goes on to write: “This is not exagerated [sic] in the least - : not one out of ten of the niggers here, who have run away from their masters (and there are thousands of them) can boast of such good clothes. Shove them into the army, I say, and let them do the fighting in this hot Department.” Given the mention “this hot Department,” which means an occupied territory of the Confederacy where considerable combat was still taking place, it was probably a solder who bought this photograph from a camp sutler (a merchant who would travel with an army to sell goods to the soldiers). He seems to have then sent it by mail, with the message inscribed on the photograph, to a friend or family member. Interpretive Commentary Interpretive Commentary This image captures two faces of white America’s relationship to race. Literally on the face, the front, of the image the writer has given the photograph his own caption: “All men are created equal.” This seems to be an expression of America’s highest ideals of equality and justice: even these to young men ― forced to live in slavery, reduced to wearing rags ― deserve to share in the equality owed by right to “all men.” The expression seem to validate the Union cause in the Civil War as a fight for those ideals: to uphold universal equality and to end the injustice of slavery. And yet, on the hidden face of the image, its back, its underside, the writer seems to speak his mind more freely. He call the escaped slaves “niggers” and seems to despise them for their condition, almost as if he were contaminated by how many of them (“thousands”) were flooding the area of Union army control. Still, despite the evident contempt, there is perhaps a ray of hope. Many whites resisted giving black men the right to fight in the war. To allow them to fight as soldiers would be to grant them an equal status to the white men as men who were up to the responsibility of facing death to preserve their liberty. Despite the coarse, even crude language this writer uses, and despite his willingness to see African Americans put in harm’s way, at least he accepts that they should have the opportunity to fight, to exchange the rags for a soldier’s uniform, and thereby to share in a common cause. Perhaps without fully realizing it, he was accepting the position of abolitionists such as Frederick Douglass that African Americans must be given the opportunity to prove themselves ready to face death to live free and to fight for the freedom of others. For a discussion of African American soldiers in the Civil War, see Erina Duganne’s essay on this site, “Black Civil War Portraiture in Context.” For portraits of black men who did get that chance to serve as soldiers in the Civil War, see this one of an anonymous private in the famed 54th Massachusetts and this one of James Trotter, a former slave who rose to officer rank and went went on to become a civil servant and author. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Figure032 Title A name given to the resource "All men are created equal" Subject The topic of the resource unknown Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource circa 1863 Type The nature or genre of the resource studio portrait (probably itinerant setting), commercial Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Greg French Collection Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Photographer Photographer https://mirrorofrace.bc.edu/files/original/d562b1373b54044c0abc347f1810d723.tif f8cd1aa36bac50257fc1163b92e56c65 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Mirror of Race Subject The topic of the resource Mirror of Race Main Collection Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data carte de visite: albumen print Physical Dimensions The actual physical size of the original image cdv standard Factual Commentary Factual Commentary The caption on this photograph reads in part: “ISAAC and ROSA, Emancipated slave Children, from the Free Schools of Louisiana. Photographed by Kimball, 477 Broadway, N. Y. Ent’d accord’g to act of Congress in the year 1863...”Printed text on the back of the card reads: “The proceeds from the sale of these Photographs will be devoted exclusively to the education of colored people in the Department of the Gulf, now under the command of Major-General Banks.” This portrait forms part of a series of portraits of a group of former slaves who toured in the North during the Civil War. They were photographed and featured in newspaper articles to bolster support for the war and to raise funds for schools and other support for emancipated slaves. Interpretive Commentary Interpretive Commentary This image, as well as the others in the series of photographs of emancipated slaves who toured the North during the Civil War, raise questions about the use of photography as a means of persuasion. These images are a very early example of photography employed as propaganda. As prints from glass plate negatives, they could be reproduced and distributed widely. But what role did the subjects of these portraits play in this process? Did they choose freely to engage in it, or was this a new form of exploitation? What about the use of children? Did they participate willingly in the long studio sessions? Were they paid? Furthermore, the photographs often employ children who look very white, some of whom could certainly pass for white. Several of the captions explicitly refer to this. Were the makers trying to shock the Northern audience and get them to see the arbitrariness of the color line, or was this a further form of exploitation, using the viewers' identification with their own whiteness to sympathize with the subjects of the photographs? For essays that address these and related themes on the Mirror of Race website, see "'As White as their Masters': Visualizing the Color Line", by Carol Goodman and "A White Slave Girl: "Mulatto Raised by Charles Sumner'", by Joan Gage. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Figure031 Title A name given to the resource Isaac and Rosa Subject The topic of the resource Isaac and Rosa Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1863 Type The nature or genre of the resource studio portrait, social-political Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Greg French Collection Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Kimball (dates Unknown Photographer Photographer) https://mirrorofrace.bc.edu/files/original/4baa21026b0f0ec6570215734193b38d.tif 1387fe5d1aa6d7eb8513c194fa4eb103 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Mirror of Race Subject The topic of the resource Mirror of Race Main Collection Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data tintype Physical Dimensions The actual physical size of the original image cdv standard Factual Commentary Factual Commentary In the 19th century both adults and children would often pose with prize possessions that they believed identified something essential about them. The central focus of this tintype is the black doll, which the girl in the photograph presents for the camera. It should be possible to identify the maker of this particular doll and thereby more precisely the date of this image. If you are an expert on 19th century dolls and can identify this one, please be in touch with us at Mirror of Race. Interpretive Commentary Interpretive Commentary For millions of girls, dolls have served as intimate companions. Dolls offer the opportunity try out the role of mother to a doll or interacting with an imaginary adult as embodied by the doll. In such play, a child learns how she does and does not, or can and cannot, fit in with acceptable social roles. In that sense, dolls have power to reinforce prevailing gender roles. They are never just toys, because all play has a seriousness to it as well. So what does it tell us that this white girl would also choose an emphatically black doll as her companion? To bring the doll to the photographer suggests the doll was a precious possession for this girl, who smiles very subtlely for the camera and looks the viewer squarely in the eye ― and she holds the dolls to meet our eye, too. By contrast, the woman with them, presumably the girl’s mother, looks aside, as if refusing to meet the viewer’s gaze. In another image from the same session with the photographer (see below), the girl cradles the doll even more lovingly, while the mother holds an umbrella over them, as if protecting them from sun or rain ― or from view. Once again, the mother looks askance, with the same quizzical look on her face as in the other photograph. Just as doll-play could reinforce gender norms, doll-play could also reinforce racial roles. And yet ― Is this girl acting out a broader social drama of racial subjection, or is she modeling an intimacy that makes even her own mother look away? Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Figure028 Title A name given to the resource girl, woman, and doll Subject The topic of the resource unknown Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource circa 1875 Type The nature or genre of the resource studio portrait Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Greg French Collection Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Photographer Photographer https://mirrorofrace.bc.edu/files/original/c9acbbb0f84e94aa5945f51e8f91bf67.tif b5bc788542c319fb2db636afbc324793 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Mirror of Race Subject The topic of the resource Mirror of Race Main Collection Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data tintype Physical Dimensions The actual physical size of the original image “gemtype” (0.75 x 1 inch) in a paper mat, cdv standard Factual Commentary Factual Commentary The photograph above is a tiny tintype portrait of kind known as the “gemtype” (click the image to the left for a close-up). Photographers would use special cameras with as many as 16 lenses to make multiple, postage-stamp-sized photographs on a single thin, metal plate, which the customer could then cut up and give to friends and family. The paper mat holding this one is embossed: “Hathaway, Photographer, Glens Falls,” which is in New York state. We know nothing about the man in the photograph, except that he is almost certainly a white man in “blackface,” which was a costume popularized by the minstrel shows of mid-19th century America. Blackface consisted of blackening a white person’s face with makeup, such as greasepaint or shoe polish, or even burnt cork. In this photograph the man also wears a wig to mimic the hair of African Americans. The minstrel show emerged in the United States in the 1830s and became enormously successful as a form of popular entertainment among whites. White performers, both professional and amateur, would wear blackface and perform satirical skits and musical numbers, posing as African Americans. Interpretive Commentary Interpretive Commentary One thing to notice about this photograph is that it was made in Glen Falls, New York, around the time of the Civil War. The extreme racial stereotyping that characterized the minstrel show was very popular in northern regions, and it is important to bear in mind that this form of racism was widespread in the United States. Blackface and the minstrel show was a form of mock reverse passing from white to black. In actual passing, a person attempts to convince others that they embody a different identity than would normally be ascribed to them. But in blackface, white performers played with taking on the persona of blacks for an audience that would still see them as white. This mock passing played on the fascination with racial boundaries. Comedy works on the borders of hysteria, and blackface touched a nerve by presenting a white person as black, exploiting a deep-seated anxiety about racial identity and purity ― but at the same time, this anxiety would be quelled by the audience knowing the performers was “really” white and by the demeaning representation of blacks, which would reassure them of their distance from the characters depicted. The audience could then return to a reassured sense of possessing their whiteness as a mark of genuine superiority, combined with a feeling of mastery over the black archetypes captured and forced, as the audience saw such performances, to reveal themselves in the caricatured forms of blackface. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Figure026 Title A name given to the resource man in blackface Subject The topic of the resource unknown Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource circa 1865 Type The nature or genre of the resource studio portrait Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Gregory Fried Collection Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Hathaway (dates Unknown Photographer Photographer) https://mirrorofrace.bc.edu/files/original/c03c06030d85ae1bae490eb80a8f6061.tif fd880b21d6ed688f1999c357967e4c73 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Mirror of Race Subject The topic of the resource Mirror of Race Main Collection Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data daguerreotype Physical Dimensions The actual physical size of the original image Quarter Plate (3.25 x 4.25 inches) Factual Commentary Factual Commentary A slip of paper that accompanied this daguerreotype identifies the man as the “Richards family slave.” Nothing more is known about this image other than it comes from the St. Louis, Missouri area. The man depicted sits holding a hoe, with his arm through the handle of a wicker basket, presumably for harvesting vegetables. He wears coarse pants and a work shirt. Judging by the style of mat and case, this photograph probably dates from the late 1840s or perhaps the early 1850s. Interpretive Commentary Interpretive Commentary Early photographs of slaves are quite rare, and they require particular care to interpret. For example, is it right to call this daguerreotype photograph from around 1850 a portrait? In her book, Delia’s Tears, Molly Rogers argues that we should not call photographs such as this one “portraits,” because that word implies that the person sitting for the photograph had a choice in how he wanted to be represented ― that the image would be in some real sense a projection of his own self-understanding. But for an enslaved person being posed for the camera by an owner, this could never be the case. And so, in viewing an image such as this, of the ”Richards family slave,” we need to be very careful about what we think we are seeing, because all of the elements here might have been arranged by the legal owners or by the photographer, and almost certainly not by the man himself, on his own initiative. For a meditation on the meaning of this photograph, see "Work and the Poetry of Sterling Brown: Reclaiming Forced Labor,” by Anita Patterson, on our essays page. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Figure025 Title A name given to the resource Richards family slave Subject The topic of the resource unknown Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource circa 1850 Type The nature or genre of the resource studio portrait Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Greg French Collection Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Photographer Photographer https://mirrorofrace.bc.edu/files/original/6a2be3bf3ec6800ee1b80047e840d2c9.tif 0af270a876a5b3efdd221d53af7e58e6 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Mirror of Race Subject The topic of the resource Mirror of Race Main Collection Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data daguerreotype Physical Dimensions The actual physical size of the original image Quarter Plate (3.25 x 4.25 inches) Factual Commentary Factual Commentary Jenny Lind (1820-1887), “the Swedish nightingale,” achieved extraordinary celebrity in mid-nineteenth century America by touring the country for singing performances under the management of P. T. Barnum, the famous circus manager and events promoter. Lind was one of the the first performers to achieve “celebrity” or “star” status, thanks in part to the overwhelming publicity and marketing efforts of Barnum. Lind married the German-Jewish pianist and composer Otto Goldschmidt (1829-1907) on Feb. 8, 1852 in Boston. Though he was Jewish and she was not, she married him despite their differences in religious background. At the time, this was a bold thing to do, but Lind’s enormous and international popularity as a performer allowed her a rare freedom from social constraints. This daguerreotype is a copy of an original made by the great Boston photographer team, Southworth and Hawes, as commissioned by Lind and Goldschmidt on the eve of their wedding. Interpretive Commentary Interpretive Commentary A broad theme we are interested in exploring at Mirror of Race is how whiteness was, and is, construed. In the America of the 19th century, and indeed well beyond that period, Jews belonged to a suspect category of people who might seem white but who did not fit the expectations of what made someone properly white. In the 19th century, nationality or ethnicity were often conflated with race, and so Jews faced exclusion not only on religious but also on racial grounds. Jews were not alone in being subjected to this kind of scrutiny and exclusion from the full privileges that whiteness bestowed. The largely Protestant white population of the United States resisted accepting Irish Catholics as members of their kind, especially as large numbers of Irish began immigrating after the Potato Famine of the late 1840s. Later in the century, southern Europeans faced similar doubts and prejudice. Otto Goldschmidt belonged to a class of persons who, as visitors to America, could rise above such prejudice, due to his being a highly educated foreigner (a German by birth) and to his success as a composer and performer of what the upper class in 19th century American society would have deemed one of the most refined cultural spheres: classical music. Furthermore, his marriage to Jenny Lind, one of the most beloved figures of the age, would have protected him to some extent, too. We hope to present more images of Jews in mid-19th century America, especially ones who made their lives in the United States, for their story is necessarily different from that of a visitor and celebrity such as Goldschmidt. We welcome submissions for our essay publication page on the topic of Jewishness and race in the United States. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Figure024 Title A name given to the resource Otto Goldschmidt and Jenny Lind Subject The topic of the resource Otto Goldschmidt and Jenny Lind Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Albert Sands Southworth and Josiah Johnson Hawes Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1852 Type The nature or genre of the resource studio portrait Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Greg French Collection https://mirrorofrace.bc.edu/files/original/e4c62621bda78547276d956385269b71.tif 916948d373aae5a9ea9b83316a99f3c7 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Mirror of Race Subject The topic of the resource Mirror of Race Main Collection Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data daguerreotype Physical Dimensions The actual physical size of the original image Sixth Plate (2.75 x 3.25 inches) Factual Commentary Factual Commentary This daguerreotype from around 1850 portrays a Native American man in European clothing. The name “Ta-Do-A-Hoc Tas” has been inscribed by hand into the silver surface of the plate. We are hoping to identify the sitter by this name, and we invite viewers with any knowledge of the language transliterated here to contact us. Interpretive Commentary Interpretive Commentary While we do not yet know who this man was, his portrait still tells us something about the fate of Native Americans in the United States. We do know that the man was Native American, because of the name, Ta-Do-A-Hoc Tas, inscribed with a sharp tool directly into the metal plate of the photograph (daguerreotypes were made on silver-coated copper plates). Ta-Do-A-Hoc Tas poses here with evident dignity and self-possession. But there are questions we can ask. Why would he wear European-style clothes? He seems very comfortable in them, as if he is quite used to them and how they should look and fit? Was he a member of one of the tribes that tied to assimilate with European practices? Did he leave his tribe entirely? Was it his decision to inscribe his name, and was this photograph his possession, or was it kept by the photographer as a kind of memento, with the name as a sort of caption? We hope that further research will tell us what language the name is in, and that this will lead to further clues about this man. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Figure022 Title A name given to the resource Ta-Do-A-Hoc Tas Subject The topic of the resource unknown Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource circa 1850 Type The nature or genre of the resource studio portrait Rights Holder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource. Greg French Collection Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Photographer Photographer