Here is an image of the majestic Governor Ames, a five masted schooner that was the world’s largest cargo vessel at the time. Named for Adelbert Ames (1835-1933), Civil War hero and governor of Mississippi, who by 1888 was living in Lowell Massachusetts. Constructed in 1888 in Waldoboro, Maine, the ship was 265 feet long. The Governor Ames was lost off Chicamacomico, North Carolina in December 1909, just a few years before the great schooners ceased to be commercially viable, and were replaced by more modern steel-hulled, steam powered ships.

This photo was taken by Charles E Bolles (1847-1914), a photographer in Boston Massachusetts in the 1870s, and later Brooklyn New York. Although best known for his images of ships, mostly taken in New York harbor, Bolles also had a studio where he took portraits, at 242-244 Fulton in Brooklyn.

Here is a classic image of the Great Sphinx in Egypt with some of the Giza Pyramids in the background. Three persons in Arab dress are included to give scale to the picture, one standing on a ledge near the chest of the Sphinx, and the other two tending to camels standing on the outstretched right paw of the Sphinx. Other figures are barely visible in the distance, approaching the Pyramid of Khafre, easily recognized because it is the only one to retain part of its original polished limestone casing at the peak. To the left is the Pyramid of Menkaure, with two peaks of the Pyramids of the Queens beyond that. The Pyramid of Khufu, sometimes called the Great Pyramid, is not visible in this view, being off to the right from this viewpoint.

The photo is by Félix Bonfils (1831-85), a Frenchman who moved to Beirut in 1867. At first studio was called ‘Maison Bonfils’ but in 1878 it was renamed ‘F Bonfils et Cie’. This image is identified as being from Maison Bonfils, and so dates between 1867 and 1878. The author titled this work ‘Le Sphynx et les pyramides de Cheffren et Mycérinus’ which translates as ‘The Sphynx and Pyramids of Khafre and Menkaure.’

This fine old image looks best very dark, as it is presented here — but if you want to see more details, just edit it in Photoshop to be much lighter. It shows a steamboat, apparently a stern-wheeler, approaching the dock at Silver Springs Florida in 1886. The boat rounds the bend into the small protected bay amid great anticipation — more than 20 people are on the shore, and almost all of them face the oncoming boat.On the boat too is anticipation, people line the decks and stand on the roof, looking shoreward. It can’t be moving very fast, for very near the prow is a small rowboat, while another waits midway between the boat and shore.

At the lower left we see a railroad car, sitting alone on the one of the two pairs of tracks. A building with an elevated platform holds some of the spectators, while others are lined along a boardwalk that runs across the lower-center part of the picture. A covered boat-dock is on the right, with a porched shed on the hill just above it. at the bottom right, beneath the large tree, is the foundation of new building being constructed, with piles of lumbers scattered around it.

This photo was taken by George Barker (1844-94), a Canadian landscape photographer who worked in London Onatrio 1857-61, then moved to Niagara Falls New York, where he worked for Platt D Babbitt for a couple years before going into business for himself. He is best known for his views of Niagara Falls, but also published a wide range of stereo views. In 1886 he took a trip to Florida, and this is among the photographs he took while there. A few years later in 1889 he hurried to the site of the Johnstown Flood disaster and recorded the carnage there. Many of his stereo views of other areas were purchased from other photographers. After his death, his negatives were purchased from his estate by Underwood and Underwood, and copies continued to be printed for many years.

This dramatic image of Niagara Falls shows four men on the near shore, all wearing top-hats, and the Falls in the background. To the left, under the shade of a tree, a group of less-distinct figures — three or four ladies and a fellow in light colored pants, can be seen. By the island in mid-falls there seems to be a tower, and on the far shore you can see a large building, probably a hotel.

The photo is by Platt D Babbitt, a daguerreian and ambrotypist in Niagara Falls NY from about 1853 to 1870. This image is an ambrotype, and dates from about 1855.