P3D History of Stereographic Imaging

[bill3dbw3d@xxxxxxxx (Bill C Walton)]

I would like to add to George Themelis' recent posting on this subject as
I think he left out a few bits of important information.  The curved or
warped stereo card was developed in 1879 and the next 40 years were,
according to some historians, the "glory years" for stereography.  The
boxed book sets, which many collectors love and which more dealers
overprice, were made during this time, covering many areas of the world. 
Stereo cards were sold door to door at decent prices. This was also when
Sears & Roebuck  got into the field of stereography and even went so far
as to produce a set of 50 cards showing the whole Sears operation  The
major stereographic companies got into the education field, as George
wrote.  But is was a major effort and I think must have had a big impact
on the education systems in big cities.  That was before my time, but I 
have read about it & studied it.  Photos from those days, 1920s early
1930s, show a class of students,  each with a stereoscope, and an article
in Stereo World explained the method that was used to pass the cards from
student to student.

There were about 8 million stereo cards produced commercially, according
to William C Darrah.  And the production lasted a lot longer than most
people are aware of.  World War I was covered extensively by
stereographers on both sides of that conflict. I have only seen one WWII
era stereo card, General Eisenhower in a vehicle, but I feel sure there
are more around.  President Eisenhower was the last president to be
stereographed while in office by Keystone, sometime in 1950s.

I think any mention of stereographic history should include the names of
Oliver Wendell Holmes, who invented the stereoscope which popularized
stereography world wide and Joseph Bates, who developed the sliding card
holder for the Holmes scope.

There have been a whole bunch of opinions on what caused stereo cards to
loose their popularity (of course those of us who like and make them know
they are still popular) and the most logical opinion. I THINK, says that
radio was the downfall of stereo card popularity.

There are many more things that could be added, but it would make this
posting to long.  If the fellow who had the original question has any
more , please send me an EMail to my address and I will try to answer it 

BILL C WALTON. ISC


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