Elmer Chickering was a photographer specializing in portraits in Boston

Boston

Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

, Massachusetts

Massachusetts

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He kept a studio on West Street, and photographed politicians, actors, athletes and other public figures such as John Philip Sousa

John Philip Sousa

John Philip Sousa was an American composer and conductor of the late Romantic era, known particularly for American military and patriotic marches. Because of his mastery of march composition, he is known as "The March King" or the "American March King" due to his British counterpart Kenneth J....

, Sarah Winnemucca

Sarah Winnemucca

Sarah Winnemucca was a prominent female Native American activist and educator, and an influential figure in the United States' nineteenth-century Indian policies...

, Edmund Breese

Edmund Breese

Edmund Breese was an American stage and film actor of the silent era. Long on the stage with a varied Broadway career before entering movies he appeared with James O'Neill in The Count of Monte Cristo , The Lion and the Mouse with Richard Bennett, The Third Degree with Helen Ware, The...

, and the Boston Americans.

Biography

Born in Vermont in 1857, Chickering moved to Boston and set up a photography studio around the 1880s. He married Mrs. R.M. Wilson, a photographer. His photographic work appeared in numerous publications, including Good Housekeeping

Good Housekeeping

Good Housekeeping is a women's magazine owned by the Hearst Corporation, featuring articles about women's interests, product testing by The Good Housekeeping Institute, recipes, diet, health as well as literary articles. It is well known for the "Good Housekeeping Seal," popularly known as the...

. In 1905 Chickering re-named his business as "Elmer Chickering Co."
In 1895 Chickering "took some pictures of A. M. Palmer's company in the play of 'Trilby

Trilby (novel)

Trilby is a novel by George du Maurier and one of the most popular novels of its time, perhaps the second best selling novel of the Fin de siècle after Bram Stoker's Dracula. Published serially in Harper's Monthly in 1894, it was published in book form in 1895 and sold 200,000 copies in the United...

' They naturally came into great demand at once. But here the difficulty ensued. Rushing over the wires came a message from Harper & Bros.

Harper & Brothers

Harper is an American publishing house, the flagship imprint of global publisher HarperCollins.-History:James Harper and his brother John, printers by training, started their book publishing business J. & J. Harper in 1817. Their two brothers, Joseph Wesley Harper and Fletcher Harper, joined them...

, saying that, as the characters were made up after Du Maurier

George du Maurier

George Louis Palmella Busson du Maurier was a French-born British cartoonist and author, known for his cartoons in Punch and also for his novel Trilby. He was the father of actor Gerald du Maurier and grandfather of the writers Angela du Maurier and Dame Daphne du Maurier...

's drawings, they should regard the sale of any such pictures as an infringement of their copyright. To this Mr. Chickering disagreed, on the ground that the photographs were not copies of any drawings, but of actual scenes on the stage, which any man might sketch. Telegrams flew back and forth, but Harper & Bros, would not yield. Meanwhile, the papers sought for the photographs. ... Inasmuch as he has 160 negatives, the question is of some moment."
After Chickering's death in 1915, "the well-known Chickering Studios, West Street, Boston ... is now owned and operated by George H. Hastings and Orrin Champlain. ... Mr. Hastings, personally, manages the Chickering Studio, which is now enjoying a large and profitable patronage."

Works with photos by Chickering

• Reifsnider. "'Sag Harbor': a study of Mr. Herne's drama of real life and its ethical aspects." The Coming Age v.3, no.1, Jan. 1900.
• Home life of governors: Governor Bates of Massachusetts. Good Housekeeping, May 1903. Photos of John L. Bates
  John L. Bates
  John Lewis Bates was born in North Easton, Massachusetts to Rev. Lewis Benton Bates, a Methodist minister, and Louisa D. Bates. He attended public school in New Bedford, Chelsea, Taunton, and eventually the Boston Latin School. He then attended the Methodist-affiliated Boston University, earning...
  
  and his family.
• Wilson's photographic magazine. 1905
• New England Magazine, May 1906.

External links

• WorldCat
• Google news archive. Articles about Chickering.
• NYPL. Works by Chickering
• NYPL. William Henry Crane as David Harum