Most photographed American of the 19th century

Frederick Douglass was the most photographed American of the nineteenth century.  "To Douglass, photography was the great "demographic art"  that would finally assert black humanity in place of the slave "thing".  Douglass stated, "Every colored house holder in the land should have one of these portraits [of a black leader] in his parlor, and should explain it to his children, as the dividing line between the darkness and despair that overhung our past, and the light and hope that now beam upon our future as a people."  His portrait gallery contains 160 photographs.  

taken from "Picturing Frederick Douglass  An Illustrated Biography of the Nineteenth Century's Most Photographed American " by John Stauffer, Zoe Trodd, and Celeste-Marie Berner