Picture Catalog Collections
In 2002, the State Library began a project creating digital copies of historic photographs and prints described in our Picture Catalog. This project covering photographs from Southern California is intended to increase access to this unique resource. Links on this page allow you to browse the images by collection. Many, but not all, of the records in these collections contain digital images.
Online records in the Picture Catalog represent only about 10% of the total holdings of the California State Library's photograph and print collections. Images not cataloged in the Picture Catalog may be searched in a special card file located in the California History Room at the State Library.
Southern California Digitization Project (SoCa)
- William Fletcher Collection (More info)
- Arnold Hylen Collection (More info)
- William Reagh Collection (More info)
- Clifton F. Smith Collection (More info)
- Frederick Martin Collection (More info)
- Southern California Stereographs (More info)
- Carleton E. Watkins Stereograph Collection (More info)
Other collections with selected digital images
- CSL's Sacramento History Online Images (More info)
- Gold Rush Exhibit (More info)
- Mexican War Prints (More info)
- Pictorial Lettersheets (More info)
- Daguerreotype Collection (More info)
- Nineteenth Century Sheet Music Project (More info)
- Dobbin's Album of San Francisco (More info)
You also may search for individual records in the State Library's Picture Catalog.
Details about each of the above links:
The Fletcher Collection includes over 600 photographs taken by Fletcher primarily during the 1880s and 1890s. It was generously donated to the California State Library by Mead B. Kibbey and represents the only significant holding of Fletcher's work. A skilled photographer with a keen eye for history, Fletcher recorded the beginnings of urban sprawl in the Los Angeles area. His views include streets scenes, houses, parks, fiestas, hotel, missions, beaches, farms, orchards, and resorts. These photographs are now available in the State Library's Picture Catalog. Catalog records can also be found in the Library's Photograph Card Catalog in the California History Room.
The Hylen Collection consists of approximately 500 images of downtown Los Angeles taken by Hylen during the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s. The collection was donated to the Library by the artist. It documents the development of Los Angeles after World War II. Views include the construction of the Statler Center and the downtown freeways, Fort Moore Hill, Bunker Hill, Civic Center, Olvera Street and the Plaza, Union Station, Pershing Square, and numerous other street scenes and houses. These photographs are now available in the State Library's Picture Catalog. Catalog records can also be found in the Library's Photograph Card Catalog in the California History Room.
The William Reagh Collection consists of over 800 images of Los Angeles taken during the 1950s through the 1980s. Reagh's views show a changing, evolving, and growing city. Many show how a particular location changed over a series of decades. They show the transformation of a flat terra-cotta and stucco town dominated by the city hall into a forest of sleek, shining glass, steel, and marble office towers surrounded by an undergrowth of traffic, parking lots, utility wires, and convenience stores. Reagh's views document the financial center's migration from Main and Spring Streets over to Figueroa and the effect of this shift on both districts. In addition to buildings and freeways, Reagh's shots reflect the diversity of people of Los Angeles, showing them walking, driving, playing, and shopping. These photographs are now available in the State Library's Picture Catalog. Catalog records can also be found in the Library's Photograph Card Catalog in the California History Room.
The Clifton F. Smith Collection comprises over 130 rare photographs from the 19th century. They range from stereo cards to large cabinet mounts. The collection, donated by Dennis Kruska, contains early views of Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Ventura, and nearby counties depicting town scenes, the surroundings, buildings, and early citizens of these areas. Notable views include the Santa Barbara Flower Festival, early mission views, early views of San Luis Obispo and exceptional views of Arroyo Grande.
The Frederick Martin Collection consists of over 3,000 6 x 8 in. black and white photographs chronicling Pasadena, the Los Angeles area, Southern California missions, Yosemite, Lake Tahoe, and the Monterey coast. The photographs in this collection were taken between 1910 and 1930. Martin settled in Pasadena at the turn of the century and began working for Kohler Photo Studio in Pasadena in 1902. He later took over the studio, renaming it the Martin Studio. Martin died in 1949. Digital images of Martin's Southern California scenes are now available with the catalog records in the State Library's Picture Catalog.
The California State Library's Stereograph Collection contains California images from many prominent and well-known photographers from the late 1850s through the 1920s. Photographers and publishers include Alfred A. Hart, C. W. Johnson, Eadweard Muybridge, J. J. Reilly, John P. Soule, I.W. Taber, Godfrey's Photographic View Rooms, Hayward & Muzzall, Thomas Houseworth & Co., Keystone View Company, and H. T. Payne & Co. Over 450 digital images of Southern California stereographs accompany the catalog records in the Picture Catalog. Images not cataloged in the Picture Catalog may be searched in a special file in the California History Room at the State Library.
Carleton E. Watkins Stereograph Collection
Carleton E. Watkins (1829-1916) is recognized as California's premier 19th century photographer. In the late 1870s this San Francisco photographer made his first trip into Southern California. He is probably the first photographer of note to systematically record images of Southern California. He returned to Los Angeles again in1880 to photograph prominent places, recording the architectural diversity of the city and the surrounding area. In addition to stereographs, Watkins made single-image boudoir cards and mammoth plates from 16 x 20 inch glass plate negatives. Over 250 digital images of Watkin's stereographs accompany the catalog records in the California State Library's Picture Catalog. Images not cataloged in the Picture Catalog may be searched in a special file located in the California History Room at the California State Library.
CSL's Sacramento History Online Images
The California State Library is one of four partners in the federally funded Sacramento History Online project funded by an LSTA grant between 2001 and 2003. This digital library consists of rare and primary source materials that document transportation in and around Sacramento and agriculture in the Sacramento Valley from the mid-19th century to the early 20th century. The State Library's images can be searched in the Picture Catalog through this link or the complete site, including images from the California State Railroad Museum Library, the Sacramento Archives and Museum Collection Center, and the Sacramento Public Library's Sacramento Room, may be viewed at www.sacramentohistory.org.
This exhibit provides an overview of the Gold Rush and emphasizes the strength of the California State Library’s Collections. It features many examples drawn from the California History Section’s extensive manuscript collections, books, pamphlets, periodicals, newspapers, prints, photographs, and ephemera.
The California State Library's Print Collection contains over 40 prints depicting the U.S.-Mexican War, 1846-1848. It was United States' first foreign war, the first war anywhere in the world to be photographed, and the first war in which newspaper correspondents regularly reported from the seat of war. Many of the prints depicting the Mexican War are from renderings drawn on the spot by artists recording the war. These prints are now available in the State Library's Picture Catalog.
The State Library's Lettersheet Collection contains over 200 pictorial letter sheet illustrations produced in the 1850s and 1860s. They provide a visual cross-section of the Gold Rush and early Silver Age in California. Manuscript letters that appear on some of these sheets add an extra dimension to the picture. Approximately 40 lettersheets have been cataloged in the State Library's Picture Catalog and are accompanied by a thumbnail image. Catalog records for the other lettersheets in the Library's collection can be found in the Library's Lettersheet Card Catalog in the California History Room
The State Library's Daguerreotype Collection contains over 250 daguerreotypes, ambrotypes, and tintypes. Many of these photographs are contained in special individually hinged cases, usually made at the time of creation by the maker, hence the term "cased photograph". They were widely available commercially from the early 1840s to1869. Seventy-eight of the Library's daguerreotypes and ambrotypes contained in cases were scanned in 2000 through a special Cased Photograph Project at the University of California, Berkeley. These photographs are now available in the State Library's Picture Catalog as well as in the Online Archive of California. Images include mainly portraits of pioneers and others significant to the history of the California Gold Rush, with some images of mining scenes, mining districts, and towns. Daguerreotype Collection photographs not cataloged in the Picture Catalog may be searched in a special card file located in the California History Room at the State Library. Viewing is restricted. However, copy prints have been made of most of the cased photographs currently listed in the Picture Catalog and all of the CSL cased photographs listed in the Online Archive of California.
Nineteenth Century Sheet Music Project
The California State Library's Sheet Music Collection contains more than 1,500 pieces dating between 1852 and 1954. Over 500 pieces selected from this collection have been cataloged and scanned through the University of California, Berkeley's Nineteenth Century Sheet Music Project. The State Library was one of 10 participating libraries in this project. Many of the items were selected for this project because of the images on the covers of the sheet music. These records are now also located in the State Library's Picture Catalog. (Individual records may be searched by author (composer name), title, or key word.) The records for sheet music not yet cataloged in the State Library Picture Catalog are located in a card file in the California History Section Room at the State Library. The University of California, Berkeley's Nineteenth Century Sheet Music Project has created a virtual collection of over 2,000 pieces of sheet music published in California between 1852 and 1900 with related materials such as catalogs, programs, and songsheets.
Dobbin's Album of San Francisco
Hamilton Henry Dobbin (1856-1930) was born in Ireland and came to San Francisco in 1874, where he worked as a reporter and as a dramatic critic. Dobbin joined the San Francisco Police Department and attained the rank of Corporal. His collection of San Francisco photos is made up of two volumes: Volume 1 consists mainly of street and building scenes, while Volume 2 is filled mostly with portraits of prominent, and other, San Franciscans (there is some overlap in subject matter between the two volumes, and parts of the collection are arranged thematically while others are not). Since Dobbin worked as a police officer he had access to photos of crime scenes and people associated with the crimes, and these are included in the collection also.