Skip to main content

Mystery Portrait

 

Do you know who I am?

by Leslie Bush


Over ten years ago, Tony Porter owner of Coronation Collectables at Gunning, now located at Grenfell was given a photograph of a stunning young lady that the current owners could not identify.

Tony was at the time, the resident Gunning writer for the local newspapers and posted an article about the picture, but sadly she still is unknown. The Donors did not know her identity, only that she was supposedly a local and their names and where they lived in Gunning have also been forgotten now. 

The photo is an Opalotype.


Unidentified Young Lady - Opalotype Photograph

She is wearing a beautiful dress with lots of soft blousy frills on the neckline; maybe she was a Debutante making her first foray into society, or a young bridesmaid at her sister’s wedding, or was she attending a ball? The portrait invokes such romanticism of a bygone era.


Item written by Tony Porter for the Goulburn Post


Opalotypes or Milk-glass positive

The basic Opalotype, or Opaltype technique, involving wet collodion and silver gelatin, was patented in 1857 by Glover and Bold of Liverpool. Opalotypes exploited two basic techniques, using either the transfer of a carbon print onto glass, or the exposure of light-sensitive emulsion on the glass surface to the negative. Opalotypes in Australia date from 1882, and were prominent from 1890–1900. Opalotype photography, never common, was practiced in various forms until it waned and disappeared in the 1930s. "Milk glass positive" is another alternative term for an opalotype. (Wikipedia)

Opalotypes were printed on sheets of opaque, translucent white glass, early opalotypes were sometimes hand-tinted with colours to enhance their effect. The effect of opalotype has been compared "to watercolour or even pastel in its softer colouring and tender mood." "Opalotype portraits" for beauty and delicacy of detail, are equal to ivory miniatures."

They aren't made in camera, but in a darkroom from a conventional negative. Multiple prints are therefore no problem.  Rarer than Ambrotypes, Opalotypes are very often hand coloured. Opalotypes are created using a four-colour carbon and mono-carbons process.


The Goulburn Picture-framers 


On the back of the frame is a label marked E.F. Railton & Co, Auburn Street, Goulburn, opp. Imperial Hotel – Mount-Cutters & Plush-Workers. No photographer is identified. 

E. F. Railton (Emma Fanny) was the wife of Lancelot Railton, a Picture Framer in Auburn Street, Goulburn who is mentioned in various newspaper advertisements, gazettes and other records.

We know it had to have been done before December 1894 as this is when Emma died and Lancelot went bankrupt.


The photo is set into deep red velvet material with a gold painted frame reminiscent of a shadow box.

If you think you know who this lovely young lady is, or know those kind people who donated the portrait, please contact us at gunninghistory@gmail.com 


Photograph and Newspaper article courtesy of Tony Porter from; 

Coronation Collectables 107 Main Street, Grenfell, NSW, 2810  

Phone: 02 – 63846218 - Email:  coronationcoll@optusnet.com.au


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

First Settlers in Lade Vale: Frank and Catherine Lawless

Is this the house that Frank built? Remains of a substantial granite block house on land once owned by the first settlers in Lade Vale, Frank and Catherine Lawless.  It may well have been built by Frank when the family took up their circa 1826 land grant. While we cannot be absolutely certain this is his work, there can be no doubt it is just the sort of house a skilled builder/bricklayer such as Frank would have constructed to settle his family in. Frank and Catherine Lawless  – The Lade Vale Years The Story So Far This is the second chapter in our look at early colonial settlers Frank and Catherine Lawless written by their 3rd great granddaughter, Carmel Peek, in association with GDHS. At the end of our last episode: Bricklayer Frank [as he was commonly called rather than by his formal given name Francis] had been transported to Sydney from Ireland in 1809 following his conviction for highway robbery; He compounded his failings and misfortunes in late 1810 whe...

Lees Family Origins: Links to Gunning

Waratah (now Warrataw) Street, Gunning, circa 1905. Article by Kim Lees The Lees family emigrated from Germany in the 1850’s as Bounty Immigrants under a scheme to bring citizens from various countries to Australia to assist in establishing farming and other industries. They came from the wine growing area of Grossbottwar, some 26 kms north of Stuttgart. It has been possible, through a German Ancestry organisation ‘Beyond History’, to trace the Lees family in Grossbottwar as far back as the late 1500s, some 6 generations before the family emigrated from Germany to Australia. In 2013 I visited Grossbottwar where I met with a cousin and his family who still live there.  The Lees family (parents Johannes (48) & Louisa (44) and children Conrad (20), Adam (16), Jacob (14), Fredricka (9), and David (6)) travelled to Australia on the Dutch Barque ‘Helene’ with 215 other German Immigrants. The youngest child, a daughter Christiana (aged 5 months) died on the voyage to Aust...

Walking and Unwitting Death Trap: September Bird of the Month

  Image courtesy Duade Paton https://www.photos.duadepaton.com From Gladstone's Notebook:  Sometimes Poisonous, yet a Culinary Delight and the Explorer’s Saviour – the Common Bronzewing   This is number 9 of a 12 part series in which we take a bird recorded in Gladstone Weatherstone’s notebook between 1962 and 1981, see if anything is different today and, if so, try to explain why.   Gladstone was a dedicated and knowledgeable amateur naturalist who lived on Lyndfield Park near Gunning from 1941 until 1996 Image of Gladstone Weatherstone courtesy Wayne Weatherstone. The Common Bronzewing   On 3 September 1967, Gladstone wrote “ Several Bronzewing Pigeons seen near Jerrawa and possibly nesting near Catherine’s Creek ”.  This bird makes only a few appearances over the 19 years covered by his notebook.  In June 1973 he wrote “ Bronze-winged Pigeon observed feeding around the house today, also two days later.  First time seen in close ....