1826: Nicéphore Niépce takes the first surviving permanent photograph 

1839: Invention of the daguerreotype by Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre is announced in Paris 

• The first publicly announced photographic process, the daguerreotype yielded unique and exquisitely detailed images. Harvard botanist Asa Gray collected daguerreotypes of his colleagues, including this portrait of his mentor John Torrey. 

• Image caption: Photographer unidentified, John Torrey, ca. 1840, quarter-plate daguerreotype, Asa Gray Papers and Daguerreotypes at Harvard. Courtesy of Gray Herbarium Archives. 
   

1839: William Henry Fox Talbot publishes his photographic process in “Some Account of the Art of Photogenic Drawing"   

• Talbot created impressions of objects by placing them on paper sensitized with sodium chloride and silver nitrate. He called them "photogenic drawings."   
   

1841: William Henry Fox Talbot introduces the calotype, a further refinement of his negative-to-positive process  

• The calotype process greatly increased the photographic sensitivity of the negative and reduced the necessary exposure time in the camera to seconds.   

• Image caption: William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-1877, British), The milliner's window, prior to January 1844, salted paper print from a calotype negative. Courtesy of Harvard Art Museums. 
   

1842: Sir John Herschel invents the cyanotype process  

• Image caption: Photographer unidentified, Menu du 2 Mars, ca. 1880, cyanotype on Victoria card mount, Edward Bangs Drew Collection. Courtesy of Harvard-Yenching Library. 
   

1847: The studio of Southworth and Hawes creates daguerreotypes taken at Massachusetts General Hospital of early operations using ether as an anesthesia at Massachusetts General Hospital  

• Early medical photography included documentation of operations and pathology views. 

• Image caption: Southworth and Hawes (active 1843-1861, American), Early operation using ether, 1847, whole-plate daguerreotype, Daguerreotypes at Harvard. Courtesy of Harvard Art Museums, on loan from the Massachusetts General Hospital Archives and Special Collections. 
   

1848: The Langenheim brothers in Philadelphia introduce the first photographic lantern slide  

• Expanding the utility of photography and making it suitable for entertainment and educational purposes, lantern slides lasted until the 1950s. 

• Image caption: Gleason, Herbert Wendell (1855-1937, American), Flowering crabapple trees (Malus) along Forest Hills Road, Arnold Arboretum, ca. 1925, hand-colored lantern slide. Courtesy of Arnold Arboretum Horticulture Library. 
   

1849: Sir David Brewster, inventor of the kaleidoscope in 1816, develops the lenticular stereoscope, which allows stereographic photographs to be easily viewed through a hand-held device 

• Stereographs, made of two nearly identical images mounted together to produce the illusion of a single three-dimensional image, became a popular parlor amusement from the 1850s to the 1920s. The format had useful applications for the arts and sciences as well. 

• Image caption: Alexander Gardner (1821-1882, Scottish), Confederate soldier, who, after being wounded, dragged himself to a little ravine on the hill-side, where he died, 1862, albumen print on stereograph mount. Courtesy of Harvard Law School Library. 
   

1850: Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard announces the method for creating albumen prints 

• Photographers readily adopted Blanquart-Evrard's new printing paper. In 1866, the British Quarterly Review estimated that in England alone six million egg whites were used annually to supply albumen for coating papers. 

• Image caption: Francis Frith (1822-1898, British), Suez, 1857, albumen print, plate 28 in Cairo, Sinai, Jerusalem, and the Pyramids of Egypt: A Series of Sixty Photographic Views by Francis Frith. Courtesy of Harvard Fine Arts Library, Special Collections. 
   

1851: Frederick Scott Archer introduces the wet collodion process 

• Requiring less time for exposures and less expensive than daguerreotypes, the wet plate collodion process provided a greater level of detail and clarity. It remained the dominant glass negative process in the United States until it was replaced by the gelatin dry plate process in the 1880s. 

• Image caption: Photographer unidentified, Accident at Merrimac St. Bridge, Newburyport, Mass., Eastern Railroad, 1873, wet collodion glass negative, Harry Chick Collection of Railroad Photographs and Ephemera. Courtesy of Baker Library, Harvard Business School, Historical Collections. 
   

1852: John Adams Whipple takes daguerreotypes of the moon through the Harvard College Observatory telescope, one of the largest telescopes in the world at the time 

• Among the earliest successful views of the moon through a telescope, John Adams Whipple's daguerreotypes ushered in the era of astronomical photography.   

• Image caption: John Adams Whipple (1822-1891, American), View of the moon, 1852, quarter-plate daguerreotype, Daguerreotypes at Harvard. Courtesy of Harvard College Observatory Library. 
   

1854: James Anson Cutting of Boston first publishes the term ambrotype in his 1854 patent for an "Improved Process of Taking Photographic Pictures upon Glass" 

• Image caption: Photographer unidentified, Man at Niagara Falls, 1858, whole-plate ambrotype, Harrison D. Horblit Collection of Early Photography. Courtesy of Houghton Library, Department of Printing and Graphic Arts. 
   

1854: The carte-de-visite format is popularized by André-Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri of Paris, whose studio was patronized by an elite clientele, including Emperor Napoleon III   

• By the 1870s, cartes de visite were made by the millions worldwide and often collected in albums for home viewing. Similar in size to the common visiting card of the period, the carte de visite consisted of a photograph, usually an albumen print, mounted on a card measuring approximately 4 x 2.5 inches (10 x 6 cm). 

• Image caption: André Adolphe Eugène Disdéri (1819-1889, French), Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte (1808-1873), Emperor Napoleon III, 1859?, albumen print on carte-de-visite mount, Portrait Collection of the Fine Arts Library: Cartes de Visite. Courtesy of Harvard Fine Arts Library, Special Collections. 
   

1856: The tintype process is patented in the United States by American scientist, photographer, and astronomer Hamilton Smith    

• Also known as a ferrotype, the tintype was an inexpensive alternative to the daguerreotype. Often made by itinerant street photographers, and almost always used for portrait photography, tintypes were popular in America until the early 20th century. 

• Image caption: Myron H. Kimball (American), Man wearing a straw hat, between 1857 and 1859, hand-colored tintype in brass mat, Harrison D. Horblit Collection of Early Photography. Courtesy of Houghton Library, Department of Printing and Graphic Arts. 
   

1863: Felice Beato, one of the first war photographers and photojournalists, arrives in Yokohama, Japan 

• Eight years after photographing the Crimean War, Felice Beato opened a studio in Yokohama. His work greatly influenced Japanese souvenir photography, or Yokohama shashin, and he became one of the most famous Western photographers in Japan.     

• Image caption: Beato, Felice (1832-1909, Italian-British), Japanese junk, 1867?, albumen print mounted in album, Early Photography of Japan. Courtesy of Harvard Fine Arts Library, Special Collections. 
   

1866: Cabinet photographs are introduced in the United States 

• Cabinet photographs gradually replaced cartes de visite in popularity. They often were studio portraits and had the photographer’s imprint on the back. Measuring approximately 6.5 x 4.25 inches (16.5 x 10.5 cm), the cabinet card format was popular until the turn of the century. 

• Image caption: Theodore C. Marceau (1860-1922, American), Margaret Ward Ellis, age about 8, ca. 1888, albumen print on cabinet card mount. Courtesy of General Artemas Ward House Museum. 
   

1869: The pictorialist movement flourishes as a photographic style from the late 1860s to the early 1900s 

• Caroline Haskins Gurrey operated a photographic studio in Honolulu and achieved recognition for her pictorialist-style portraits of Hawaii's mixed-race children. 

• Image caption: Caroline Haskins Gurrey (1878-1927, American), The mat-weaver, between 1905 and 1909, toned gelatin silver print, Pure and Mixed Hawaiians. Courtesy of Tozzer Library. 
   

1874: Silver gelatin paper becomes commercially available   

• The widespread use of silver gelatin paper in the 1890s made it the most common black-and-white photographic print process of the 20th century.   

• Image caption: Photographer unidentified, Margaret Wessell Piersol and friends at Ruggles Point, ca. 1908, gelatin silver print, Anne Murray Morgan Papers. Courtesy of Radcliffe College Archives. 
   

1877: Eadweard Muybridge develops a fast shutter and embarks on human and animal locomotion studies 

• Image caption: Eadweard Muybridge (1830-1904, British), Animal locomotion, 1887, collotype. Courtesy of Harvard Art Museums. 
   

1885: French criminologist and anthropologist Alphonse Bertillon introduces the modern mug shot 

• Working for the Paris Prefecture of Police, Bertillon included standardized photographic portraits in the comprehensive files he created for identifying criminals. His system was soon adopted by police in Great Britain, Europe, and the United States. 

• Image caption: United States Army Office of the Chief of Counsel for War Crimes, Guenther Nebelung, 1947?, gelatin silver print, Office of the United States Government for Germany (OMGUS) Military Tribunal Case Three [of the Nuremberg Trials] Photograph Collection. Courtesy Harvard Law School Library. 
   

1888: George Eastman markets the Kodak No. 1 box camera with the slogan, “You press the button, we do the rest" 

1897: J. B. Millet Company of Boston publishes Japan: Described and Illustrated by the Japanese, illustrating the multi-volume set with approximately one million original photographs 

• J. B. Millet was one of the last publishers to illustrate a book with original photographs. Instead of using faster, less expensive photomechanical processes, the publisher commissioned the studio of Japanese photographer Tamamura Kozaburo to produce hand-colored albumen prints for its masterwork on the history and culture of Japan.   

• Image caption: Tamamura Kozaburo (1856-1923?, Japanese), Peddler with cart full of bamboo baskets, brooms, and other merchandise, ca. 1894, hand-colored albumen print, Japan: Described and Illustrated by the Japanese, Imperial Edition, Volume XII. Courtesy of Harvard Fine Arts Library, Special Collections. 
   

1898: Alta-Vista introduces the first mass-produced American panoramic camera 

• The first panoramic photographs appeared as early as 1845, but the Alta-Vista and the No. 4 Kodak Panoram, introduced in 1899, allowed amateurs to take small panoramas of no more than 12 inches using roll film and no tripod. 

• Image caption: George F. Slade Jr. (1874-1955, American), Lake Sunapee, N.H., ca. 1900, gelatin silver print on cardboard mount, George Augustus Gardner Collection of Photographs. Courtesy of Cabot Science Library. 
   

1900: Eastman Kodak introduces the Brownie camera at the retail price of one dollar 

• Arguably the most popular camera of the 20th century, the easy-to-use, inexpensive Kodak Brownie greatly expanded the amateur market for photography, leading to generations of snapshooters, who often compiled their photographs into albums. 

• Image caption: Photographer unidentified, Theodore Roosevelt standing over a bear carcass surrounded by dogs, 1905, gelatin silver print mounted in album, C. E. Emery Souvenir Kodak Album of President Roosevelt's Bear Hunt in Colorado. Courtesy of the Theodore Roosevelt Collection, Harvard College Library. 
   

1903: The invention of the airplane by the Wright brothers revolutionizes aerial photography 

• Image caption: Photographer unidentified, Aerial view of Harvard Stadium and environs, 1907, gelatin silver print. Courtesy of Harvard University Archives. 
   

1906: J.P. Morgan finances Edward Curtis to document the traditional culture of the North American Indian 

• Curtis's project constituted a set of 20 volumes, with each volume accompanied by a portfolio of large-size photogravures. Volume one of The North American Indian appeared in 1907, and in 1930, the last two volumes were finally published, completing nearly thirty years of work. Only 272 complete sets were printed. 

• Image caption: Edward Sheriff Curtis (1868-1952, American), A sea otter hunter, 1915, photogravure. Courtesy of Harvard Art Museums. 
   

1907: In France, the Lumière brothers introduce the autochrome color process 

• The first commercial color process, the autochrome became popular with amateur photographers and remained available until the late 1930s. 

• Image caption: George Henry Seeley (1880-1955, American), Still life with textile, vase, and pottery, 1908?, autochrome. Courtesy of Harvard Art Museums. 
   

1924: Surrealist photography is introduced in Andre Breton's publication The Manifesto of Surrealism 

• The Welsh photographer Angus McBean used techniques such as photomontage to create this surrealistic portrait of Audrey Hepburn. 

• Image caption: Angus McBean (1904-1990, Welsh), Audrey Hepburn, 1950, gelatin silver print. Angus McBean Photographs. Courtesy of Harvard Theatre Collection. 
   

1925: Leica I becomes the first practical and commercially successful 35 mm camera 

• Image caption: Milman Parry (1902-1935, American) or Albert Bates Lord (1912-1991, American) (taken with a Leica 35 mm camera), On the Prizren-Skopje road, Macedonia, "Gypsy fortuneteller," between 1933 and 1935, gelatin silver print. Courtesy of the Milman Parry Collection of Oral Literature, Widener Library. 
   

1934: The National Alliance of Art and Industry exhibition in New York features advertising and industrial photographs in a fine art setting 

• By the 1930s, photography had become the medium of choice for most print advertising, and a new generation of photographers applied a modernist sensibility to their commercial work. 

• Image caption: John Paul Pennebaker (1903-1953, American), Sealed Power Piston Rings, ca. 1930, gelatin silver print, 1934 National Alliance of Art and Industry Exhibition Collection. Courtesy of Baker Library Historical Collections, Harvard Business School. 
   

1935: Eastman Kodak introduces Kodachrome, the first color transparency film 

• Image caption: Photographer unidentified, A dog sitting on rocks with the sea in the background, 1947, Kodachrome print, Papers of Priscilla Dewey Houghton. Courtesy of Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Radcliffe Institute. 
   

1936: Henry Luce's Life, the first all-photographic American news magazine, appears on newsstands 

• Image caption: Margaret Bourke-White (1904-1971, American), "Life" magazine photographer Margaret Bourke-White standing with an aerial camera in front of a Flying Fortress bomber in Algeria, self-portrait, 1943, gelatin silver print. Courtesy of Harvard Art Museums.   
   

1940: New York's Museum of Modern Art establishes the first department of photography in an art museum and names Beaumont Newhall director 

1942: Eastman Kodak develops the Kodacolor process for making color prints from color negatives 

• Image caption: Paul Child (1902-1994, American), Julia Child picking peas, Lopaus Point, Maine, 1958, Kodacolor print, Additional Papers of Julia Child. Courtesy of Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Radcliffe Institute. 
   

1947: Edwin Land introduces the first instant camera, the Polaroid Land Camera Model 95, which produces prints in approximately 60 seconds 

• Image caption: Photographer unidentified, Lillian Greneker and unidentified man seated indoors, in formal wear, 1950, Polaroid print, Papers of Lillian Louise Lidman Greneker. Courtesy of Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Radcliffe Institute. 
   

1949: The International Museum of Photography opens at the George Eastman House in Rochester, N.Y. 

1955: Edward Steichen curates “The Family of Man” exhibit at New York's Museum of Modern Art 

1962: National Geographic, an early pioneer of printed color photographs, becomes the first major American periodical to publish an issue with all color photographs 

• Image caption: Gordon W. Gahan (1945-1984, American) (taken on assignment for the National Geographic Society), Richard Leakey riding a camel, man with camera walking nearby, Lake Rudolf, Kenya, 1969, Ektachrome transparency (35 mm slide format), Gordon Ward Gahan Photographs and Papers. Courtesy of Harvard Fine Arts Library, Special Collections. 
   

1963: Kodak releases the Instamatic, the first point-and-shoot camera 

1975: Steven Sasson, an engineer at Eastman Kodak, develops the first digital camera  

• Image caption: Fotini Christia, Tehran billboard featuring Iran's supreme leaders, 2006, digital photograph, Tehran Propaganda Mural Collection. Courtesy of Fung Library. 
   

1977: Susan Sontag’s On Photography is published 

• Image caption: Bettye Lane (1930-2012, American), Writer Susan Sontag speaking at a conference on older women in New York City, 1986, gelatin silver print, Bettye Lane Photographs. Courtesy of Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Radcliffe Institute. 
   

2000: Camera phone is introduced  

2004: Kodak ceases production of film cameras