Keystone view company

Boxed set of 75 stereoscopic views, World War I scenes with lengthy captions, part of the Stereographic Library issued by the Keystone View Co., ca. 1914-1918. Includes images of battlefields and trenches, armaments, cavalry, buildings, hospitals and cemeteries, dirigible, German prisoners, and Treaty of Versailles. Mainly images from France, but also Belgium, Germany, Turkey (Gallopoli), London, training in the U.S., ships at sea, and one view of submarines, battleships, and torpedo boats in San Diego Bay.

From the description of World War Through The Stereoscope, [ca. 1914-1918] (University of California, Santa Barbara). WorldCat record id: 66392889

Stereographs were a very popular entertainment medium from the late 1880s to the 1970s. Many different photographic processes were used to produce stereographs, including dauerreotypes, ambrotypes, wet plate glass positives, salt paper prints, albumen prints, and gelatin prints. Stereographs were formed of two images placed side by side and were commonly produced with cameras that had two lenses side by side. This selection features only paper prints from wet collodion negatives. The Keystone View Company was created in 1892 in Meadville, Pennsylvania by B.L. Singley as a company whose primary focus was to create a large variety of stereographs. By 1905 it was the largest sterographic company in the world. Keystone created and distributed millions of stereographs throughout the United States. In 1898 they organized their highly successful Education Department which produced boxed sets for school instruction of images and descriptive text illustrating culture, industry, commerce and politics world-wide. Stereographs came in different sets marked by a letter. Customers could buy stereographs by the "book", a box shaped like a book which contained 50, 100, or 200 stereographs. This collection prominently features set "P", the educational set designed for elementary school-aged children. While stereographs had been losing popularity shortly after cinema became one of the most popular entertainment mediums, the Keystone View Company continued to produce stereocards until 1972 when it went out of business.

From the description of Keystone View Company stereograph collection, 1895-1905. (San Jose Public Library). WorldCat record id: 705583758

From 1892 to 1963, the Keystone View Company produced thousand of images of people and places from the United States and around the world. The photos are of historical, social, cultural, and geographic interest. The company was founded in Meadville, Pennsylvania in 1892 by B.L. Singley, an amateur photographer who began by selling glass slides of local interest. The slides soon became a popular form of entertainment and the company grew to include some 50,000 images. As other forms of entertainment replaced the viewing of lantern slides, the company's growth slowed. It was purchased in 1963 by the Mast Development Company. Mast retained a Keystone division for a short time that manufactured products for the optical profession.

From the description of Industrial lantern slide collection. [ca. 1900-1920] (Historical Society of Pennsylvania). WorldCat record id: 62314617

The Keystone View Company was formed in 1892 in Meadville, Pennsylvania by B.L. Singley, a former salesman at Underwood & Underwood. Incorporated in 1895, the company went on to become the largest publisher of stereographs. In 1898, it organized its highly successful Education Department, which produced boxed sets of images and descriptive text illustrating culture, industry, commerce, and politics for classroom use. Although the company hired its own professional photographers, it also purchased rights to other negatives, including a series of Underwood & Underwood negatives in 1912. The Keystone View Company continued operations until the 1970s.

From the description of Keystone View Company lantern slides, ca. 1892-ca. 1912. (College of Charleston). WorldCat record id: 69341966

The Keystone View Company was a major distributor of stereographic images, and was located in Meadville, Pennsylvania. From 1892 through 1963 Keystone produced and distributed both educational and comic/sentimental stereoviews, and stereoscopes. By 1905 it was the world's largest stereographic company. In 1963 Department A (stereoviews sold to individual families) and the Education Departments were closed down, but Keystone continued to manufacture eye-training stereographic products as a subsidiary of Mast Development Company. In 1972 Mast closed the Meadville manufacturing site.

From the description of Calumet & Hecla Mining Company Stereographs, Circa 1910. (Michigan Technological University). WorldCat record id: 717283000

The Keystone View Company was founded in Meadville, Pennsylvania in 1892. By 1905 it was the foremost producer of stereo views in the world. From 1892 to 1963 Keystone produced both educational and comic/sentimental view images using staff photographers whose work was not credited. In 1963 the company was sold and its home-sales stereo view division was closed.

From the guide to the Keystone View Company "Tour of the World" Stereographs 88-374., ca. 1892-1933, (Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin)

The Keystone View Company was founded in 1892 by B.L. Singley in Meadville, Penn. Its produced stereographs for wide distribution.

From the description of Keystone View Company stereographs, circa 1900s. (Brigham Young University). WorldCat record id: 123235403

Publisher of stereographs, travel views, and related educational material.

From the description of Stereographs, ca. 1892- ca. 1930. (Duke University Library). WorldCat record id: 122476506

From the description of Stereographs, ca. 1892- ca. 1930. (Duke University Library). WorldCat record id: 18182371

Thomas Moran (1837-1926) was a painter from California.

The Keystone View Company was a producer of stereographic views, est. 1891 in Meadville, Pa.

From the description of Thomas Moran, celebrated artist, sketching near Yavapai Point, Grand Canon [sic] Nat. Park / [graphic] Keystone View Company. [ca. 1890] (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 744434095

The Keystone View Company was founded in 1892 by B.L. Singley, an amateur photographer from Meadville, Pennsylvania. The company grew to be the largest and most prominent publisher of stereoscopic photographs in the United States. Indeed, by the 1920s Keystone was the only major publisher of stereoscopic photographs in the world with offices in London, Paris, Sidney, Capetown, Rio de Janeiro and Tokyo. In 1918, Keystone became one of the only publishers permitted to photograph World War I battlefields and military operations. In 1939 competition from the motion picture and the radio industries led Keystone to cease regular production; however, the company continued to fill individual orders and manufacture stereoscopes for optometric purposes until the late 1960s.

The photographer of the World War I series was Andrew S. Iddings. Joseph Mills Hanson authored the text accompanying the photographs. Keystone first published the World War I collection in 1923 with several subsequent additions. The company produced four collections of various sizes (75, 100, 200 and 300) using the World War I stereoscopic photographs.

From the description of World War I stereographic library, 1918-1921. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 85016112

Thomas Moran (1837-1926) was a painterfrom California.

The Keystone View Company was a producer of stereographic views, est. 1891 in Meadville, Pa.

From the description of [Thomas Moran] [graphic] / Keystone View Company. [ca. 1890] (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 220213423

The Keystone View Company was founded in Meadville, Pennsylvania in 1892.

By 1905 it was the foremost producer of stereo views in the world. From 1892 to 1963 Keystone produced both educational and comic/sentimental view images using staff photographers whose work was not credited. In 1963 the company was sold and its home-sales stereo view division was closed.

From the description of Keystone View Company "Tour of the World" Stereographs, ca. 1892-1933. (University of Texas Libraries). WorldCat record id: 698358732

Biography

The Keystone View Company was founded by amateur photographer, B. L. Singley of Meadville, Pennsylvania, in 1892. Taking advantage of the public's curiosity in viewing disasters, Singley launched the company into the stereo market with sets of thirty stereo cards that recorded the flooding of the nearby French Creek. The growth of stereo photography, depicting national and international subjects, paralleled the emergence of modern America on the world's stage. Other factors which bolstered stereography's popularity was the novelty of experiencing explicit three-dimensional detail in a stereo card and the potential for card owners to frequently revisit views of world events in privateor during social gatherings. Stereographs were to nineteenth century generations, what television and the Internet are to contemporary culture, and enabled armchair observers to have vicarious experiences in faraway places.

Dates attributed to Keystone-Mast images range from late-nineteenth to mid-twentieth century (with the strengths between 1895 and 1928). The collection is a composite of several stereographic publishing companies. By 1920,the Keystone View Company cornered the market by acquiring the negative collections of all major stereograph publishers such as B. W. Kilburn, H. C. White, Underwood and Underwood, and C. H. Graves. In 1939, Keystone View Company was marketing over 40,000 stereoview titles.

A large number of sales were generated through the efforts of door-to-door salesmen, often groups of college students who would canvasentire towns. The stereograph's combination of educational value and entertainment potential appealed to the emerging middle-class families. An excerpt from Keystone sales literature states, "The stereograph gives reality to the World Tour and is exceeded only by the actual experiences of travel." While this assumption is opento criticism, it remains a powerful sales incentive today and is one element inthe current popular fascination with the Internet and World Wide Web [Howard Becker, "Stereographs: Local, National, and International Art Worlds,"Points of View: The Stereograph in America, A Cultural History, Edward W. Earle, ed., Rochester: Visual Studies Workshop Press, 1979. pp. 89-96. Edward W. Earle, "Millennium: The End of the World As We Know It," SF Camerawork, (21:2) Fall/Winter, 1994, pp. 12-19. Edward W. Earle, "Millennium," (an evolving essay on photography, American history, and networked information at http://www.cmp.ucr.edu/collections/whitepapers/1995/edward_earle/millenium/ )]

Another sales engine that powered Keystone View Company's success well into the twentieth century was its marketing ofeducational systems. Schools, libraries, and other educational institutions were provided with boxed sets of stereo cards at competitive prices. In 1922, Keystone boasted that every school district in a city with a population of over 50,000 had the Keystone System for each of its school. Notable educators, historians, and authors were commissioned as consultants; among the editorial advisors were the poet Carl Sandburgand Ernest Thompson Seton. Keystone engaged the popular travel lecturer, BurtonH olmes, to author much of the company's literature. Inspired marketing and broad ranges of worldwide imagery perpetuated the stereographs as popular objects for enjoyment and education. Keystone's stereo publishing reign continued through 1930s.

Finally, production of stereo cards stopped in 1939. The company's production moved from stereographs to producing instructional lantern slides for schools. Sets of these 4x5 inch glass-mounted transparencies were published into the 1950s. The Keystone View Company was sold to the Mast Development Company in 1963. The Keystone division of the Mast Company continued to manufacture stereoscopic viewing devices for vision testing. However, they had no market forthe enormous collection of prints, glass and film negatives. In 1977, Mead Kibbey, a businessman from Sacramento, California, successfully negotiated the donation of the Keystone View Company's archive to the University of California. After thirty-eight years of nearly idle storage, family members of the late Gifford Mast of Davenport, Iowa donated the collection intact to UCR/California Museum of Photography. In a tribute to the Mast family, the collection is subsequently known as the Keystone-Mast Collection.

In 1990, the collection was moved from the UC Riverside campus into a state-of-the-art collection room of a renovated 3-story structure, redesigned specifically for UCR-California Museum of Phototgraphy. The collection will be moved one final time to the adjacent Art and Barbara Culver Center of the Arts, where the negatives will bestored in new cabinets on seismically isolated bases.

From the guide to the Keystone-Mast Collection, 1870-1963, (UCR/California Museum of Photography)

"The Keystone View Company was founded in 1892 by amateur photographer B.L. Singley of Meadville, Pennsylvania. Singley began his venture by marketing sets of thirty stereo-cards that recorded the flooding of nearby French Creek. Eventually additional photographers were employed and the Keystone View Company became the largest company of its kind concentrating on national and international subjects under 'geographic' and 'social science' headings. The images capture individuals, buildings, and landscapes from around the world. While photographs of statesmen, inventors, and industrialist were included, most of the shots of people are of industrial or rural work scenes.

"The Keystone lantern slides quickly became a popular form of entertainment. The company's collection of images continued to grow and by the 1920's, the company cornered the market, having acquired the collections of several large image publishers. The advent of film and television from the 1930's through 1950's, caused the company to shift its focus from entertainment to education. In 1963 the Mast Development Company purchased the Keystone View Company. By this time there was no longer a market for the slides and production was terminated. From its peak from 1895 through the 1920's Keystone manufactured hundreds of thousands, of slides of its more than 50,000 images."

Bibliography:

Smith, Steven. Finding aid for "Keystone View Company lantern slides." Historical Society of Pennsylvania, collection V-29. Accessed November 23, 2011. http://www.hsp.org/sites/www.hsp.org/files/migrated/findingaidv29keystone.pdf

From the guide to the Keystone View Company lantern slides, circa 1900-1905, (Millbrook Society)