Photograph album # I

Contains 43 cartes-de-visites /photographs mostly of male and female members of the Sharpless family and allied families - Townsend, Baldwin, Penniman, Brown, Troth and Stackhouse. Together with a round engraved portrait of John Townsend (1716-1803), believed to be accomplished by the noted French émigré artist, Charles B.J.F. de Saint-Memin. The portrait measures 5.5cm in diameter and is pasted on a front page of the album. One of the cartes-de-visite depicts Joanna Sharples (1763-1843), mother of Mira Sharpless Townsend, attired in traditional Quaker dress. The photograph is a copy of an earlier daguerreotype by the noted Philadelphia photographer, Frederick Gutekunst whose studio on Arch Street produced several other portraits in this collection. Pasted above this photograph is an ornately printed obituary relating to Joanna Townsend (1721-1786), wife of John Townsend and mother of Joanna Townsend Sharples. It contains eight lines of precise description relating to her life. The verso bears the inked inscription "Printed by the order of her husband John Townsend for each of his children. l788." This memorial inscription is surrounded by two different ornate typographical border designs, most likely printed in Philadelphia and is possibly a unique surviving copy.