James Abram Garfield, 1831-1881.  20th President of the United States, 1881.  Scarce, magnificent 4” x 6” cabinet photograph boldly signed J. A. Garfield. 

This bust portrait is one of the finest Garfield signed photographs that we have ever seen.  It is not yellowed, and the surface is still glossy.  Garfield has signed with a large 3” fountain pen signature. 

We have done considerable research to determine whether Garfield had to sign this photograph while he was President.  If Garfield sat for the portrait after his inauguration on March 4, 1881, or so shortly before the inauguration that he would have been President before he could have signed this print, then the signature is necessarily of presidential date.  Material that Garfield signed as President is, of course, extremely rare because he was shot on July 2, 1881, just under months after his inauguration, and died on September 19, 1881, after only six months in office.  He is known to have signed only three things after he was shot.

We are continuing our research, but what we know about this photograph so far is this:

The photo is an Artotype manufactured by the noted company Harroun & Bierstadt of New York, whose circular blind stamp appears in the lower right corner.  Photographer Edward Bierstadt, of Harroun & Bierstadt, was the brother of noted nineteenth century artist Albert Bierstadt.  Artotypes were variants of the collotype process, in which a metal or glass plate was coated with gelatin to produce a printing surface.  The plate was exposed against a negative and then washed and treated with glycerin to make the gelatin surface selectively absorbent.  Ink adhered more readily to the parts of the image containing the least water.  Paper prints were then made from the inked plate.

Bierstadt did not take the photograph, however.  The Ohio Historical Society’s collection includes a print of this image mounted on a card, on the back of which appears this legend:  “Negative by H. W. Tibbals, Painesville, O. expressly for E. Bierstadt, New York.”  According to Ohio Photographers, 1839-1900 by Dianne VanSkiver Gagel, a photographer named Horace W. Tibbals worked in Painesville, Ohio, from 1871 to 1884.  Painesville is a small city in Lake County, east of Cleveland, some seven miles from Mentor, Ohio, where Garfield’s home, Lawnfield, is located. Garfield bought Lawnfield in 1876 and lived there when he was elected President in 1880.  It thus appears that Tibbals took the photograph for Bierstadt and sent the negative to him to make the Artotype. 

The United States Copyright Office records show that Bierstadt registered the copyright on this Artotype on October 5, 1881.  The records show two copyright registrations of Garfield photographs by Tibbals on January 12, 1882—# 592, entitled “J.A. Garfield No. 2,” and # 593, entitled “J.A. Garfield No. 3.”  The copyrights thus were registered after Garfield died.

The Library of Congress has a copy of this Artotype in its collection, but it was donated in 1963 and does not tie to the Copyright Office records.  It has two other pieces that bear this image, both of which derive from this one.  One is by Bierstadt, published E.B. Treat of New York.  It bears a reversed oval print of this image, has the dates of Garfield’s life and a preprinted signature in the margin, and states in tiny print beneath the image “copyright 1881 by edward bierstadt.”

The image in this photograph is used in the Bureau of Engraving and Printing’s official presidential portrait of Garfield, the die for which was engraved by Lorenzo Hatch in 1881.  It was also used on the 6¢ stamp issued in 1903.

It thus is quite possible that Garfield signed this photograph as President.  Even if Tibbals took the photograph before Garfield took office, a good amount of time would have elapsed by the time he sent the negative to Bierstadt in New York, Harroun & Bierstadt manufactured the Artotype, and the piece got to Garfield for his signature.

The form of the signature, J. A. Garfield, is not determinative.  In their book From the President’s Pen, Larry F. Vrzalik and Michael Minor note that although Garfield began using his full signature, James A. Garfield, on official documents as President, “he also continued signing his name with his initials on unofficial documents.”  Larry F. Vrzalik & Michael Minor, From the President’s Pen: An Illustrated Guide to Presidential Autographs 59 (1991).

Because we cannot yet say for sure that this photograph was signed as President, we have not priced it as such.  Regardless of its date, however, this is an absolutely stunning image of Garfield with an exceptional signature.  It belongs in the finest of presidential collections.

Unframed.