The Home of Washington, as it appeared May 14th 1859. Baltimore, H.E. Hoyt & Co., 1859

The earliest dated photograph of Mount Vernon, this is one of the very earliest known photographs of George Washington’s home.

$12,500

Anthony Berger. Abraham Lincoln, seated portrait.. Washington: Mathew Brady Gallery, 9 February 1864

The classic Brady $5 bill photograph. This celebrated portrait, the basis for the five-dollar bill engraving used for most of the 20th century, is one of seven poses taken by Anthony Berger at Mathew Brady’s Washington, D. C. studio on February 9, 1864. The most prolific photographer of Lincoln, Brady himself did not actually operate his cameras during the war years, instead training and employing men like Alexander Gardner and his successor Anthony Berger, who took this picture, to operate the camera.

$12,000

Panoramic view of Washington, D.C., with the Capitol dominating the scene in the distance. Washington, c. 1877-1882

This magnificent mammoth plate panorama shows the National Mall and the Capitol as seen from the Smithsonian Castle.

$12,000

Photographic album of Gothic architecture and proposed designs for the Royal Courts of Justice, London. Various places, 1868-70

This splendid album contains 120 fine medium and large format photographs of Gothic and High Victorian Gothic architecture.

$12,000

An album of 32 photographs of Yosemite and the American West. Various places, c. 1890s

This beautiful album contains many splendid views of the scenic wonders of Yosemite. Subjects include the many magnificent falls, the Mariposa Grove of sequoias, and the great geological formations. At least two of the views in this collection were taken by Carleton Watkins. Those for which attribution to Watkins has been confirmed are singled out below, but this collection merits further investigation to identify Watkins photographs.

$12,000

Catalogue of the celebrated collection of works of art and vertu known as “The Vienna Museum,” the property of Messrs. Lowenstein Brothers, of Frankfort-on-the-Main. London: Christie, Manson & Woods, 1860

This important volume is “the earliest photographically illustrated auction catalogue” (Gernsheim, Incunabula, 122). It contains 36 photographs on salted paper by Hermann Emden of Frankfurt.

$12,000

Calotype of Water Tower. Philadelphia, 1849

This important survival of American photographic history is a very early calotype of a water tower in Philadelphia. Paper photography from this era is a rarity and the image was created by two of America’s great photographic pioneers, the Langenheim brothers.

$11,000

Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant. Philadelphia: Gutekunst, April or May 1865

This impressive full-length portrait of Grant in uniform was made at war’s end to capture the triumphal hero at the height of his powers. This portrait shows Grant emulating the pose of Napoleon in David’s famous Napoleon in his Study (1812), a pose favored in military portraits of the time.

$9,500

Maj. Gen. Abner Doubleday. No place, 1860s

This is a rare large format portrait of the famed general Abner Doubleday. Doubleday played a prominent role in the Union Army from the war’s outset. He was was second in command at Fort Sumter when the war started. He later commanded a division at Antietam, Gettysburg and other major battles.

$9,500

Signed photograph of Watson and Crick with their three-dimensional model of the double-helix DNA molecule. Anthony Barrington, 1953, printed later

Signed by Watson and Crick in the white lower margin. The discovery of the structure of DNA was the cornerstone event in modern genetics and biology and one of the greatest scientific discoveries of all time.

$9,500