Photography genius: George R Lawrence & "The hitherto impossible

Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, Summer 2002 by Petterchak, Janice

Other features included light-proof curtains (resembling window shades), which protected the negative before and after exposure. The camera could be adjusted for either upright or horizontal views. The large photographic plate was created by the Cramer Dry Plate Company. "Owing to the dimensions required," wrote a reporter, "it was necessary to provide new apparatus. A great marble slab, larger than the plate, was the first requisite. Upon this the plate is resting while the coating is being applied. Large pieces of ice beneath the slab keep it at a temperature that will cool the emulsion rapidly as it is applied."14 New developing and printing methods were also worked out. The negative plates cost $1,800 per dozen.

In a letter to the editor of Photographic Times, Lawrence's partner, Anderson, described "the largest camera in the world":

This camera is constructed to allow a full exposure of a plate measuring 56x96, and embodies, in its construction, all the improvements an up-to-date camera can have, being reversible, having double swing back, rising and swinging front, and an arrangement for bracing the back that makes it as rigid as the back of a small camera, thus dispensing with any jar or vibration while an exposure is being made.

In the construction of the four bellows-two cone and two square-there was over fifty yards of heavy black rubber sheeting used, and though they allow an extreme focus of fifteen feet, yet so compact were they made, the whole camera can be folded to three feet.

The holder is curtain slide, and although fifty feet of fiveeight inch lumber was used for the slide it was made to work so easily that a boy of fourteen years would have no difficulty in drawing it.

As a ground glass for focusing in this mammoth camera would be clumsy to handle and liable to breakage two frames were made to slide on the back of the camera, and celluloid strips made to fit in these frames, making a very light and satisfactory substitute for the usual ground glass.15

With his camera transported on a special railroad flatcar, Lawrence made the Chicago and Alton photograph at Brighton Park, about six miles from downtown Chicago. "The day was clear but a high wind was blowing, notwithstanding which, after an exposure of two and one-half minutes, on a full Cramer Isochromatic Plate (this special plate being used to preserve the color value of the train), a perfect negative was secured. The picture of The Alton Limited ... was reproduced, without the slightest 'retouching' upon the part of the engraver, from a platinum print."16

Three prints of Lawrence's huge Alton Limited picture were submitted for the Paris Exposition of 1900. One was placed in the railway section, another was hung in the photographic section, and the third was given a place of honor in the United States Government Building, "a liberality of exhibition privileges accorded to no other single exhibit in the entire Exhibition." At first the judges in a photography competition branded the image a "fake" and sent the French Consul General from New York to inspect the camera in Chicago. Convinced of its authenticity, Exposition officials awarded Lawrence their "Grand Prize of the World for Photographic Excellence."