Unknown American
The Falls of Minnehaha, 1850s
Daguerreotype, 6 x 4-3/4 inches
Purchase, Horace W. Goldsmith and Art Purchase Fund

This extraordinary, atypical view of a remote and exotic waterfall is one of the earliest American scenic daguerreotypes. While outdoor daguerreotypes are rare, it is more unusual to see a daguerreotype of pure landscape. With no utilitarian purpose, the artistic landscape or scenic daguerreotype held little commercial value for the 19th-century American. This landscape photograph suggests a conscious effort to make an image that could be considered as art by a maker who was clearly accomplished at daguerreotypy.

Alexander Hesler (1823-1895) claims it was his daguerreotype of Minnehaha that sparked Henry Wadsworth Longfellow to write his epic poem, The Song of Hiawatha. In the poem, Longfellow created an analogy between the falls and an Indian maiden, both named Minnehaha. Hesler made photographs of both Minnehaha and St. Anthony Falls on August 12, 1852. With the assistance of Joel Emmons Whitney, who became a noted Minneapolis daguerreotypist, Hesler first photographed St. Anthony's Falls, then:

"At one P.M. we started for Minnehaha. Arriving there, we prospected for the best view, and selected that from the upper side where the bluff makes a turn south, where, looking west you face the fall, with the gorge in the foreground. The fall in the middle - & the rapid with the country beyond [in] the distance. Here after cutting down two trees we had an unobstructed view and secured 25 or 30 pictures."


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