Niagara Falls Through the Mist in Summer, c. 1850

Platt D. Babbitt (1822-1879) was born in Massachusetts, and was known for his photographs of Niagara Falls. He opened a gallery on Ridout Street in London, Ontario in November 1850, and advertised as an itinerant in Niagara Falls. By 1853 he was established at Niagara Falls in a pavilion, seen here, overlooking the falls from where he sold daguerreotypes and ambrotypes to visitors.

Beginning in 1854, Babbitt arranged for permission to set up his camera on the American side of Niagara Falls in an area called Prospect Point, where he made numerous views, and countless portraits of visitors. Often using whole plates, his work captured impeccable details of the misty thundering falls in all seasons.

The two full plates in the Maillet Collection were purchased in the Feigenbaum sale in 1999. Babbitt’s work can be found in the collections of the George Eastman Museum, The J. Paul Getty Museum, and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.