Hagelstein Brothers; 122 years of Photography in New York City

This entry consolidates (and amplifies) the information collected in this space on the history of Hagelstein Brothers, Photographers, a firm that flourished for 122 years after being established a year after the Civil War.  They were pioneers in so many areas that the Eastman Kodak Photography Museum eagerly accepted some of their work I was able to collect over the years.  As the last generation in line to inherit the business (which I declined) I felt an obligation to document their contributions to commercial photography in New York.  Through this blog, researchers, former employees, even former customers offered further information on the firm. 

My hope was to publish one definitive history on Wikipedia.  I have previously submitted pieces for the “people’s encyclopedia” before but that was when it was relatively new, and although I know how important it has become as a central repository of knowledge, it has also acquired the trappings of a government onto itself, with its own rules and volunteers to patrol its pages.  This is understandable as otherwise people could publish fabrications and self serving articles.  Their technical requirements are now more demanding as well (beyond my patience to learn).

Wikipedia cautions that articles about “family…or anything else you're closely affiliated with” are not acceptable.  It says the topic must be "notable... [and] it must itself have been addressed in outside reliable sources….[T]his means the topic must have been written about in newspapers or magazines or books. Not blogs….Not self-published websites.”  Well that pretty much eliminates all the research and good faith publishing I’ve done and as someone who is “family” in this submission, my work might immediately be suspect to Wikipedia’s volunteer editors.  The possible result as they put it is to summarily delete it. 

Bypassing Wikipedia also enables me to personalize it to some degree, injecting the perspective of my own experience.  When I do so, it is with objectivity, mostly my remembrances having worked there summers as a teenager.  I thank the people who noted my early articles and sent information to supplement them, including Hagelstein Brothers prints they had from the 19^th century and forwarded digitally.  Also, one photographer, Jim Cummins who began his career at Hagelstein Brothers, contacted me with his recollections.  As he is from a long line of professional photographers who worked at Hagelstein Brothers, I incorporate his comments here:

Hagelstein Brothers was a commercial photography studio at 100 5th Avenue in Manhattan. They started as a portrait studio on the lower East side in 1866, just after the Civil War. Through the years they transformed into a commercial photography studio photographing everything from jewelry to large setups and events. They could photograph everything. At the helm of this studio were the brothers Bob and Phil Hagelstein. They were not just good Photographers but were innovators who had cut the template on how commercial photography was done in New York and elsewhere. They closed in 1988 after 122 years in the business. What made Hagelstein Brothers unique was not just the fact that both brothers were good Photographers but Phillip was good at marketing. They were the first in using color film when their competitors were still using black and white.

I was fortunate to have worked there from 1959 through 1960. Although I was an art student, I always had an interest in photography and this was the perfect place to learn the craft. From setting up sets to lighting to matting and stripping of negatives. (There was no Photoshop back then). I learned how to light an entire room with one light and how to use an 11X14 view camera. This is an education that I could not have gotten going to a school. This was on the job training. The knowledge I got working at Hagelstein Brothers has stuck with me to this day. I've been a Photographer for 54 years.

Some of the many things I learned from Bob and Phil were quality and the ability to be able to photograph any and everything. 

So, I publish this originally “Wikipedia-intended” article here and will reference this link in my prior entries on the topic.  Thus, anyone searching for information on the company will ultimately be led here.

 

Hagelstein Brothers, Photographers 

 

 The cofounders of Hagelstein Brothers, Carl (Carl Philipp Wilhelm) and Philip (Anton Philipp Wilhelm), immigrated to the United States in the mid-19^th century.  Gertrude Wilhelmine Kirschbaum Hagelstein who, as the widow of Wilhelm Hagelstein (born Dec. 10, 1794 and died sometime in 1842), embarked to America on March 20, 1856 from Prussia, Port of Cologne, at the age of 48, giving up her Prussian citizenship and those of her children.  Gertrude was the daughter of Philipp Kirschbaum, a factory overseer in Bergenhausen, Germany.  Perhaps, as a widow, with seven children, she saw better opportunities for them all in America.  She brought with her six of her children among whom were Carl Philipp Wilhelm (26 years old) and William (Adolf Theodor Wilhelm, 16 years old).  Philip (Anton Philipp Wilhelm, born March 12, 1833) arrived sometime before his mother and siblings.

What happened between the family’s arrival at Ellis Island to the end of the Civil War is relatively unknown; although it appears they settled in Brooklyn.  William was drafted into the Union Army and he survived the war, returning to Brooklyn and went into the metal fabrication business.  Carl went to California to make his fortune but came back after the war. 

Philip Hagelstein (Great-Grandfather)

At the end of the Civil War brothers Carl and Philip were ready to start or buy a business.  On June 7, 1866 they paid $1,450 for the “lease, goodwill, stock, and fixtures for entire and contents of the Photographic Gallery and business carried on in the upper part of the premises of 142 and 142 ½ Bowery in the City of New York, “or about $25,000 in today’s dollars.  Perhaps Carl did make his fortune but Philip (my great-grandfather) was the driving force behind the business.  Presumably he knew or studied the business of photography.  Jeremy Rowe who has been “researching photographic studios and operations in New York City from the birth of photography to ca 1880” published a valuable article on the importance of New York City photographers to the development of photography in the Daguerreotype Journal (follow the prompts to Page 16)

In his Bowery studio Philip originally specialized in fine Daguerreotypes and portraits made on wet plates, working with the limited materials available at that time. Examples of his Daguerreotypes dating from 1860 to 1870 were included in the Eastman Kodak exhibit during the 1939 New York World's Fair.  About 1880 he began to pioneer in commercial work for manufacturers and gradually developed this specialty.  In 1900 portrait work began to be discontinued and attention was focused on two special fields, one dealing with the manufacturer's merchandising needs, and the other consisting of reproductions of paintings for artists and publishers.

Philip’s son Harry Philip (born 1/26/1885 and died 1/3/1953 – my grandfather) entered the business around 1905; and around 1915 he moved the business from the Bowery to 100 Fifth Avenue where it flourished (completing its transition to a commercial photographic firm from portrait and arts photography) through the depression and two major wars.  HB made a major coop by being named the official photographer of the famous 1913 Armory Show which brought Modern Art to America.

Perhaps if photographic technology stayed the same the firm would have pursued arts photography as its major business.  When arts photography was flourishing the firm made direct negatives from 11 x14 to 24x30, and reproductions in black-and-white, sepia, and hand colored prints on platinum paper which were sold to publishers and art dealers.  They made exquisite reproductions of noted paintings which were done on platinum papers.  This part of the business was discontinued due to the entry of mechanical printing processes, such as photogravure and color printing.

Harry P. Hagelstein (Grandfather)

Harry P. had a sister Kate who was given part of the stock in the business when their father, Philip, died in 1919.  Kate eventually gave her stock to two of her sons, William and Harry McClelland, and when Harry P. died in 1953 he left his stock to his sons, my father Harry R. (who went by the name of Robert, born April 17, 1916 and died on March 19, 1984) and my Uncle Philip (born 06/27/1911 and died 05/14/1999).  Other equal shares of Harry P.’s stock were left to his daughters, my aunts Marion, Lillian, and Ruth.   

Eventually the sisters’ shares were sold to my father, Robert who began to run the business after my grandfather’s death.  His photographic skills were acquired first on the job and from being a signal corps photographer in WW II.  He was active in the closing years of the war in Germany and was part of the occupying force, returning home in January 1946.  Although it was said that Jack M. Warner, the son of the legendary movie mogul, invited him to join him in Hollywood after they collaborated on some WW II training films, Robert decided to return to the family business.  

Robert (Father) and Philip (Uncle)

By the 1950s Hagelstein Brothers had become one of the leading commercial photographers in New York City.  His cousin, William McClelland, was the lead photographer outside the studio, travelling to customers’ showrooms or to the Furniture Exchange building, while his other cousin, Harry, ran the photo printing departments.  My father was the leading studio photographer.  His brother, my Uncle Philip, a graduate of Columbia University (who perhaps gave up a more lucrative career in finance to be loyal to the family business), focused on marketing and bookkeeping.

Robert Hagelstein (Father) in 100 5th Studio

A decade of business success followed in the 1950s as the studio was able to print huge quantities of glossy photos which were used as salesmens' samples for their customers, the majority of which were furniture and lamp manufacturers.  By the 1960s the firm was making its transition to color photography and color prints. 

Business strategy, succession planning, and personality clashes gradually led to the firm’s demise.  Robert had been grooming me, his son, Robert Philip, for succession by employing me as a student from the age of 13 during the summers, (first working as a delivery boy, then in the black and white printing department, and then as a studio photographer’s assistant, and finally in the color processing lab), with plans to send me into the Signal Corps upon my graduation from high school.   Instead I chose to go to college and eventually became a publisher. 

Robert Philip Hagelstein

 

Sometime after I decided not to participate in the business, my father bought out his cousins’ share in the business and he and his brother Philip continued on their own, still employing the old business model of producing prints (now mostly color) for salesmen.  Gradually the business declined and finely they lost their lease (or couldn’t afford it) on their penthouse studio at 100 fifth Avenue, a gothic architecturally designed building built in 1906 which was being repurposed for high end businesses with “new, modern lobbies that create an edgy, innovative look designed to appeal to a new generation of corporate entrepreneurs.”   

This ultimately forced them to move to 46-02-37th Avenue in Long Island City, only to oversee the company’s total demise a few years later.  142 Bowery, the birthplace of the photography studio, was sold with four other attached buildings, for $47 million dollars in 2015. These were among the few remaining Federal period buildings in the area.

All in all, it’s a remarkable history of a studio which was established a year after the end of the Civil War and the three generations of Hagelstein men who ran the business until it finally folded on June 9, 1988, 122 years and 2 days after it was established.  The records of Hagelstein Brothers and, more importantly, hundreds and hundreds of Daguerreotypes and glass plate negatives were destroyed in the early 1990's when my Uncle Philip's home (where they were stored) had to be sold and he went into a nursing home suffering from dementia.  Regrettably no interest at the time was expressed either by libraries or museums and there was no place to store them.  Today, they would have all been digitized.

Some of the original Daguerreotypes from the firm as well as two trade catalogues of Hagelstein Brothers are now housed in the George Eastman museum, so some of their early work can be seen there.

Hagelstein Brothers Updated

It’s an interesting phenomenon writing a blog about all sorts of subjects, from personal to more universal subjects.  The personal entries have a tendency to give rise to the so called six degrees of separation and ultimately lead to contact with people who share that personal connection.  In particular, the historical information I’ve posted on my father’s photography business, Hagelstein Brothers, which was established by my great grandfather in 1866. has given rise to such correspondence, as well as Daguerreotypes from their studio when they were at 142 Bowery, New York City.

Naively, I had thought the business was one of the few originals in New York City.  I should have known, by then there were plenty, but few of those businesses lasted 118 years such as Hagelstein Brothers, Photographers.

Most recently I was contacted by Adam Woodward, a resident of the Bowery and an inveterate collector of all things Bowery, including some of the work of my forefathers, which he kindly forwarded to me and has allowed me to publish them here.  We speculate that the man with chemistry apparatus is my great grandfather himself, in his photography attire.

An interesting article of Adam’s search for salvaged material from old buildings on the Bowery appeared in the New York Times

Adam in turn put me onto Jeremy Rowe who has been “researching photographic studios and operations in New York City from the birth of photography to ca 1880.”  Jeremy sent me a fascinating article on the NYC Daguerreian era which can be found at this link, following the prompts to Page 16.

 

Switching subjects, my blog has been relatively quiet, avoiding all things political, as I’ve been working on a book based on a selection of my blog articles and weaving a narrative around them in an attempt to understand the insanity we call today's politics, fiscal policy and cultural mores.  Appropriately, the book is entitled: Waiting for Someone to Explain It; The Rise of Contempt and the Decline of Sense.  More on that later but if posting in this space is less frequent than in the past that is a partial explanation.

Hagelstein Bros., “Photographers of the Fine Arts and Manufacturers”

After coming across what I thought was the one and only extant catalogue Hagelstein Brothers ever issued, another one materialized thanks to a bookseller in Vancouver, WA., the very knowledgeable Kol Shaver of Zephyr Used & Rare Books. 

This one is an earlier catalogue --issued circa 1925.   No doubt it was assembled by my grandfather and amazing that ninety years later it wound up in his grandson's possession.  I was acutely aware of family hands across time while unwrapping the package after I had ordered the catalogue.  Could he have imagined something like the Internet which makes these connections possible? 

Clearly, the firm had left its portrait photography behind, soon after departing its original studio at 142 Bowery and moved to 100 Fifth Avenue in approximately 1915, where it was to remain until the early 1980s at which time its penthouse location became prohibitively expensive.  It was then my father and uncle moved the entire operation to Long Island City and to oversee the company’s demise only a few years later.

Would my father, grandfather, or great-grandfather recognize those buildings today, with 142 Bowery and 100 Fifth Avenue becoming gentrified?  At least the 20 story 100 Fifth Avenue, built in 1906, is still recognizable, although repurposed for high end businesses with “new, modern lobbies that create an edgy, innovative look designed to appeal to a new generation of corporate entrepreneurs.”  The building’s French Gothic façade remains.

Alas, 142 Bowery, the birthplace of the photography studio, was recently sold with its sister building 140 Bowery, for $22 million!!!  The plan is to tear them down, probably to create high-end condos.  These are among the few remaining Federal period buildings in the area. 

I fondly remember working at 100 Fifth Avenue as a teenager during the summers, the office, the shipping room, the studio, the black and white and color darkrooms, and the printing facilities for producing mostly glossies used for salesmen’s samples. After its success as a portrait photography studio, it reinvented itself as a “Fine Arts” photography studio.  This came on the heels of the success in being the official photographer of the 1913 Armory Show which brought Modern Art to America.

I think Kol was delighted to find the information I had posted and naturally a potential buyer for this 1925 catalogue.  He also suspected I would be the kind of buyer who would treat it with the proper reverence.   As he said, “bravo for being able to purchase and preserve it, as far too many of these catalogues are being taken apart and pieced about by eBay sellers, and other photographic purveyors.”  Spoken as a true antiquarian, he later added: “I feel like I’m in a constant race with those breaking up these wonderful artifacts, and archives.”

My ultimate intention is to donate them to a museum photographic collection, so they can no longer be pulled apart and are available to researchers for years to come.  They are both in excellent condition.  The catalogue which I previously wrote about might be the more interesting one because of its diversity, although this catalogue, which specifically covers only fine furniture, might be more revealing of the times, the roaring twenties, perhaps the furniture of the Great Gatsby (the novel was written at about the same time as the catalogue).  Zephyr’s description of the furniture pictured here is impeccable, so I quote it in its entirety:

[JAZZ AGE FURNITURE -- PHOTO CATALOGUE]. [HAGELSTEIN, Harry P.] [Excellent salesman sample photo catalogue with over 100 original silver gelatin photos of quality furnishings for 1920s New York homes, most of them with measurements and product number in lower fore-edge].  [New York: Hagelstein Brothers Photographers, ca. 1925].  Oblong 4to. 11.5 x 8.25 in. 117 original silver gelatin photos, mounted on linen hinges, most w/ product number and negative number in upper, or lower margins, many with pencil annotations on versos. Contemporary simulated black leather post-binder, screw posts at gutter margin, rounded corners, gilt stamping of Photographers studio on front pastedown (slight shelfwear), NF copy.

First edition of this lavishly illustrated Jazz Age furniture catalogue, filled with original photographs of styles inspired by designs from Sheraton, Heppelwhite, Chippendale, Renaissance Revival, Jacobean Style, and many others. Although unidentified, the broad product line, the quality of the furniture, the available styles, and even some of the product numbers are identical to the furniture produced by Berkey & Gay who during the Roaring 20s were one of the largest manufacturers of fine furniture in the world. Berkey & Gay concentrated on Elizabethan, Renaissance, some American Revival Federalist Styles, and even English Regency, during this era, incorporating a wide variety of woods, and especially dark mahoganies and walnuts.

This is a large catalogue with more than 100 prints, so I include representative samples of them here, in the order in which they appear.  Perhaps another catalogue will turn up; I doubt it.  All in all, it’s a remarkable history of a studio which was established the year after the end of the civil war by my great grandfather and his brother and ended 120 years later when my father died and my Uncle Philip could no longer carry the business forward.  It evolved from portrait photography, to photography of fine arts and furniture, to what it later billed itself as “commercial and illustrative photography.” 

In photographing the contents of this 1925 catalogue I did not unfasten the pages in an effort to avoid any damage, so some of the photos might seem slightly distorted.  I’m hoping the New York Public Library Photographic Collection or a similar repository will accept this and the other Hagelstein Brothers materials I have in my possession once I have them organized so they may be viewed there for generations to come.