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Arthur Churchill Warner photographs, approximately 1880-1940

Overview of the Collection

Photographer
Warner, Arthur Churchill, 1864-1943
Title
Arthur Churchill Warner photographs
Dates
approximately 1880-1940 (inclusive)
Quantity
40 boxes (including prints, glass negatives, lantern slides, and nitrate negatives)
1,324 photographic prints (6 boxes)
989 glass negatives (12 boxes)
1,266 lantern slides (17 boxes)
232 nitrate negatives (5 boxes)
Collection Number
PH0273
Summary
Photographs of Seattle, the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition (AYPE), and Washington, Canada and Alaska locales
Repository
University of Washington Libraries, Special Collections
Special Collections
University of Washington Libraries
Box 352900
Seattle, WA
98195-2900
Telephone: 2065431929
Fax: 2065431931
speccoll@uw.edu
Access Restrictions

Selected images can be viewed on the Libraries' Digital Collections website. Permission required to view originals. Contact Special Collections for more information.

Request at UW

Languages
English
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Biographical Note

A.C. Warner was a staff photographer for the Northern Pacific Railway when he first came to Washington Territory. Born in Massachusetts in 1864, his youth had been spent in Minnesota where he studied photography and found the job that took him to the Far West in 1886. In Seattle, Warner soon formed a short-lived partnership with one Davis, working jointly to make and sell some fairly conventional views of Seattle, the ships on Elliott Bay, and the mills along the waterfront. In 1888, he was engaged by John Muir to join a Mount Rainier climbing expedition. His personal account of the first historic use of the camera on the upper slopes and at the summit of the mountain was published in The Mountaineer(1956).

After Warner married Edith Randolph, the daughter of the well-to-do Captain Simon Peter Randolph, he formed a business partnership with his father-in-law. S.P. Randolph may have furnished the necessary capital and Warner the essential camera and legwork for an adventure in Gold Rush photography in Alaska. In the summers of 1898, 1899 and 1900, Warner went to Alaska as a prospector, a packer and a photographer. The cartouche on the reverse of his Alaskan cabinet mounts provides a Seattle address and gives an indication that the Alaskan specialty of Warner was in views of Skagway, Dyea and the Chilkoot Pass.

After 1900, Warner remained in Seattle to pursue several lines of work - as a photographer for the publisher Lowman and Hanford, as a confectioner with a shop in the Seattle Hotel on Second Ave., and as a sales agent for the landscape paintings and photographs of Albert Henry Barnes of Tacoma who died in 1920. After Barnes death, Warner became more active in his own photographic enterprises, continuing until his death in 1943. In 1925 he commenced the Warner Projection Company and found a ready market for art deco projection slides to be used with cartoons and the lyrics of popular songs which might be projected on the theater screen. In addition, together with his wife, Warner presented illustrated lectures on the wild flowers of western Washington.

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Content Description

Images of Seattle, the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition, Washington localities including A.C. Warner's August 1888 Mt Rainier summit climb, the Klondike and Nome Gold Rushes, Native Alaskans, ships, the Warner family and the partnerships of Warner and Davis and Warner and Randolph.

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Use of the Collection

Alternative Forms Available

View selections from the collection in digital format .

Restrictions on Use

Status of creator's copyrights is unknown; restrictions may exist on copying, quotation, or publication. Users are responsible for researching copyright status before use.

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Administrative Information

Arrangement

The images in the collection are arranged in two parts: photographs that have been determined most likely to have been made by A.C. Warner; and photographs acquired by A.C. Warner from other collectors and sources. These photographs are either by known photographers, or, if the creator is unidentified, not likely attributed to A.C. Warner.

Arranged in 2 series.

Processing Note

Title of some images revised to align with harmful language guidelines, 2022.

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Detailed Description of the Collection

 

Names and SubjectsReturn to Top

Subject Terms

  • Visual Materials Collections (University of Washington)
  •   Alaska Natives--Photographs

Personal Names

  •   Warner, Arthur Churchill,   1864-1943--Photographs

Geographical Names

  •   Alaska--Gold discoveries--Photographs
  •   Alaska--Photographs
  •   Rainier, Mount (Wash.)--Photographs
  •   Seattle (Wash.)--Photographs
  •   Yukon--Gold discoveries--Photographs


2009 (Last modified: 7/9/2025)

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