Farnham Maxwell-Lyte
Encyclopedia
Farnham Maxwell-Lyte (10 January 1828 – 4 March 1906) was a chemist
and the pioneer of a number of techniques in photographic processing
. As a photographer he is known for his views of the French Pyrenees
.
, Devon
, the fifth and last child of Henry Francis Lyte
(the author of "Abide with Me
") and Anne Maxwell. In 1851, he married Eleanora Julia Bolton (1828–1896), daughter of Cornelius H. Bolton, of Faithlegg, Co. Waterford, with whom he had five children. His son Cecil Henry Maxwell-Lyte married Hon. Mary Lucy Agnes Stourton, daughter of Alfred Joseph Stourton
, 24th Baron Segrave and Mary Margaret Corbally, on 4 October 1894.
Maxwell-Lyte was 16 when he first came across photography, hearing the news of William Henry Fox Talbot's invention of the calotype
. In 1846, he entered Christ's College
, Cambridge
, where he graduated BA in chemical engineering in 1851 and MA in 1863. On leaving Cambridge he became a mining engineer and was an Associate of the Society of Civil Engineers
and a Fellow of the Chemical Society
.
in the Pyrenees on account of his bad health and in 1856 his family joined him. He settled in Pau, and frequented an English circle where he met a group of photographers including John Stewart, Jean-Jacques Heilmann, Pierre Langlumé and Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard
, who were known as the "Group of Pau". He lived in France from 1853 until 1880. In 1854, he was one of the founders of the Société française de photographie
and he was also an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society
.
and wax paper, and introducing a process of his own invention which he called métagélatine; this process was adopted by several photographers and is described, as the "Metagelatine Dry Process", in Wilson's Cyclopedic Photography. In 1854 he wrote up the results of his investigations into what became known as the "honey" process. This was "a method of improving the wet-collodian process by extending the longevity of the sensitized plate". As its name suggests, in this process honey
was used both as the preservative solution and in the dusting-in process. The 17 June 1854 issue of Notes and Queries
contains his description and analysis of his experiments with the process. Maxwell-Lyte's letter appeared a fortnight after George Shadbolt, former editor of the British Photographic Journal, had independently contacted the Photographic Society (now the Royal Photographic Society), giving his description of an identical experiment with honey.
He was one of the pioneers of inserting an imported sky into a landscape photograph to mitigate the problems of sensitivity of the collodion plates, a process that he justified in a letter of 6 November 1861 to the journal Moniteur de la photographie. In the April 1862 issue of the British Journal of Photography he published his findings on the presence of "anti-chlors" in photographic paper, a substance that jeopardised the stability of silver prints. He introduced borax
and phosphate
toning baths that are still used today, as well as pioneering the use of iodide
.
Maxwell-Lyte photographed the mountains, villages, waterfalls and bridges of the Pyrenees, often exhibiting his photographs under the auspices of the Société française de photographie
. He showed them almost every year from 1855 to 1865 in cities such as London
, Glasgow
, Edinburgh
and Paris
, and received several international prizes: he won the siver medal at 1855 Exposition Universelle
in Paris, and his Pyrenean landscapes gained him a gold medal in Bordeaux
in 1859. He also regularly submitted photographs to the Photographic Society of Scotland's annual exhibition in Edinburgh
, sending his entries from his home in Pau and winning silver medals at the 5th exhibition (for Pierrefith) and 7th exhibition (for Lac d’Oo). Despite the thoroughness of his instructions for the transport of his fragile prints from Pau to Scotland, the Daily Scotsman of 26 December 1859 wrote:
Several of his photographs were included in an 1858 volume of Pyrenean views entitled Vues, costumes et monuments des Pyrénées, copies de grands maîtres.
, a learned society devoted to the ethnographic and scientific study of the Pyrenees. Although he did not take part in the initial meeting at the hôtel des Voyageurs in Gavarnie attended by Henry Russell
, Charles Packe
, and Émilien Frossard and his two sons, he attended the second meeting at Frossard's house in Bagnères-de-Bigorre. At this meeting the rules for admittance were laid down, the society was given its name, and executive positions were decided upon; Maxwell-Lyte was chosen as the society's first vice-president. It was on the initiative of the Société Ramond that the observatory on the Pic du Midi de Bigorre
was built. Before its construction, Maxwell-Lyte had carried out observations with a large telescope, and made photographs of the eclipse
of the sun of 18 July 1860. He also made meteorological readings, determining the average temperature of Bagnères-de-Bigorre over two years of recordings.
. Returning to his original profession as a mining engineer, he bought the sulphur springs of Moudang and a salt mine in Dax, but these were failures. He died suddenly in 1906 at his residence at 60 Finborough Road, South Kensington
, London, and was buried at St Mary the Boltons
, Kensington
. In its review of the year 1906, the British Journal of Photography noted his death and offered the following estimation of his contribution to photographic processing:
Chemist
A chemist is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties such as density and acidity. Chemists carefully describe the properties they study in terms of quantities, with detail on the level of molecules and their component atoms...
and the pioneer of a number of techniques in photographic processing
Photographic processing
Photographic processing is the chemical means by which photographic film and paper is treated after photographic exposure to produce a negative or positive image...
. As a photographer he is known for his views of the French Pyrenees
Pyrenees
The Pyrenees is a range of mountains in southwest Europe that forms a natural border between France and Spain...
.
Early life
Maxwell-Lyte was born on 10 January 1828 in BrixhamBrixham
Brixham is a small fishing town and civil parish in the county of Devon, in the south-west of England. Brixham is at the southern end of Torbay, across the bay from Torquay, and is a fishing port. Fishing and tourism are its major industries. At the time of the 2001 census it had a population of...
, Devon
Devon
Devon is a large county in southwestern England. The county is sometimes referred to as Devonshire, although the term is rarely used inside the county itself as the county has never been officially "shired", it often indicates a traditional or historical context.The county shares borders with...
, the fifth and last child of Henry Francis Lyte
Henry Francis Lyte
Henry Francis Lyte was a Scottish Anglican divine and hymn-writer.-Youth and education:Henry Francis Lyte was born to Thomas and Anna Maria Lyte on a farm at Ednam, near Kelso, Scotland...
(the author of "Abide with Me
Abide With Me
The hymn tune most often used with this hymn is "Eventide" composed by William Henry Monk in 1861.Alternate tunes include:* "Abide with Me," Henry Lyte, 1847* "Morecambe", Frederick C...
") and Anne Maxwell. In 1851, he married Eleanora Julia Bolton (1828–1896), daughter of Cornelius H. Bolton, of Faithlegg, Co. Waterford, with whom he had five children. His son Cecil Henry Maxwell-Lyte married Hon. Mary Lucy Agnes Stourton, daughter of Alfred Joseph Stourton
Alfred Stourton, 23rd Baron Mowbray
Alfred Joseph Stourton, 20th Baron Stourton, 24th Baron Segrave, 23rd Baron Mowbray was the son of the nineteenth Baron Stourton....
, 24th Baron Segrave and Mary Margaret Corbally, on 4 October 1894.
Maxwell-Lyte was 16 when he first came across photography, hearing the news of William Henry Fox Talbot's invention of the calotype
Calotype
Calotype or talbotype is an early photographic process introduced in 1841 by William Henry Fox Talbot, using paper coated with silver iodide. The term calotype comes from the Greek for 'beautiful', and for 'impression'....
. In 1846, he entered Christ's College
Christ's College, Cambridge
Christ's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge.With a reputation for high academic standards, Christ's College averaged top place in the Tompkins Table from 1980-2000 . In 2011, Christ's was placed sixth.-College history:...
, Cambridge
University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...
, where he graduated BA in chemical engineering in 1851 and MA in 1863. On leaving Cambridge he became a mining engineer and was an Associate of the Society of Civil Engineers
Smeatonian Society of Civil Engineers
The Smeatonian Society of Civil Engineers was founded in 1771, and was originally known as the Society of Civil Engineers, being renamed following its founder's death...
and a Fellow of the Chemical Society
Chemical Society
The Chemical Society was formed in 1841 as a result of increased interest in scientific matters....
.
Photography
In 1853, he travelled to Luz-Saint-SauveurLuz-Saint-Sauveur
Luz-Saint-Sauveur is a commune in the Hautes-Pyrénées department in south-western France.-References:*...
in the Pyrenees on account of his bad health and in 1856 his family joined him. He settled in Pau, and frequented an English circle where he met a group of photographers including John Stewart, Jean-Jacques Heilmann, Pierre Langlumé and Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard
Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard
Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard was a French cloth merchant by trade, but in the 1840s became a student of photography. He studied the Calotype process, and in 1847 became the first person to publish the process in France...
, who were known as the "Group of Pau". He lived in France from 1853 until 1880. In 1854, he was one of the founders of the Société française de photographie
Société française de photographie
The Société française de photographie is an association, founded in 1854, devoted to the history of photography. It has a large collection of photographs and old cameras...
and he was also an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society
Royal Photographic Society
The Royal Photographic Society is the world's oldest national photographic society. It was founded in London, United Kingdom in 1853 as The Photographic Society of London with the objective of promoting the Art and Science of Photography...
.
Processing
As both a chemist and a photographer, Maxwell-Lyte made many improvements to the technique of photographic processing, working with collodionCollodion
Collodion is a flammable, syrupy solution of pyroxylin in ether and alcohol. There are two basic types; flexible and non-flexible. The flexible type is often used as a surgical dressing or to hold dressings in place. When painted on the skin, collodion dries to form a flexible cellulose film...
and wax paper, and introducing a process of his own invention which he called métagélatine; this process was adopted by several photographers and is described, as the "Metagelatine Dry Process", in Wilson's Cyclopedic Photography. In 1854 he wrote up the results of his investigations into what became known as the "honey" process. This was "a method of improving the wet-collodian process by extending the longevity of the sensitized plate". As its name suggests, in this process honey
Honey
Honey is a sweet food made by bees using nectar from flowers. The variety produced by honey bees is the one most commonly referred to and is the type of honey collected by beekeepers and consumed by humans...
was used both as the preservative solution and in the dusting-in process. The 17 June 1854 issue of Notes and Queries
Notes and Queries
Notes and Queries is a long-running quarterly scholarly journal that publishes short articles related to "English language and literature, lexicography, history, and scholarly antiquarianism". Its emphasis is on "the factual rather than the speculative"...
contains his description and analysis of his experiments with the process. Maxwell-Lyte's letter appeared a fortnight after George Shadbolt, former editor of the British Photographic Journal, had independently contacted the Photographic Society (now the Royal Photographic Society), giving his description of an identical experiment with honey.
He was one of the pioneers of inserting an imported sky into a landscape photograph to mitigate the problems of sensitivity of the collodion plates, a process that he justified in a letter of 6 November 1861 to the journal Moniteur de la photographie. In the April 1862 issue of the British Journal of Photography he published his findings on the presence of "anti-chlors" in photographic paper, a substance that jeopardised the stability of silver prints. He introduced borax
Borax
Borax, also known as sodium borate, sodium tetraborate, or disodium tetraborate, is an important boron compound, a mineral, and a salt of boric acid. It is usually a white powder consisting of soft colorless crystals that dissolve easily in water.Borax has a wide variety of uses...
and phosphate
Phosphate
A phosphate, an inorganic chemical, is a salt of phosphoric acid. In organic chemistry, a phosphate, or organophosphate, is an ester of phosphoric acid. Organic phosphates are important in biochemistry and biogeochemistry or ecology. Inorganic phosphates are mined to obtain phosphorus for use in...
toning baths that are still used today, as well as pioneering the use of iodide
Iodide
An iodide ion is the ion I−. Compounds with iodine in formal oxidation state −1 are called iodides. This page is for the iodide ion and its salts. For information on organoiodides, see organohalides. In everyday life, iodide is most commonly encountered as a component of iodized salt,...
.
Landscape photography
Maxwell-Lyte took scenic photographs in the period just before commercial photographers started to take and market mass-produced views in the 1860s. According to Dan Younger (in notes for an exhibition of antique photographs at Kenyon College):Maxwell-Lyte photographed the mountains, villages, waterfalls and bridges of the Pyrenees, often exhibiting his photographs under the auspices of the Société française de photographie
Société française de photographie
The Société française de photographie is an association, founded in 1854, devoted to the history of photography. It has a large collection of photographs and old cameras...
. He showed them almost every year from 1855 to 1865 in cities such as London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, Glasgow
Glasgow
Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...
, Edinburgh
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
and Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, and received several international prizes: he won the siver medal at 1855 Exposition Universelle
Exposition Universelle (1855)
The Exposition Universelle of 1855 was an International Exhibition held on the Champs-Elysées in Paris from May 15 to November 15, 1855. Its full official title was the Exposition Universelle des produits de l'Agriculture, de l'Industrie et des Beaux-Arts de Paris 1855.The exposition was a major...
in Paris, and his Pyrenean landscapes gained him a gold medal in Bordeaux
Bordeaux
Bordeaux is a port city on the Garonne River in the Gironde department in southwestern France.The Bordeaux-Arcachon-Libourne metropolitan area, has a population of 1,010,000 and constitutes the sixth-largest urban area in France. It is the capital of the Aquitaine region, as well as the prefecture...
in 1859. He also regularly submitted photographs to the Photographic Society of Scotland's annual exhibition in Edinburgh
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
, sending his entries from his home in Pau and winning silver medals at the 5th exhibition (for Pierrefith) and 7th exhibition (for Lac d’Oo). Despite the thoroughness of his instructions for the transport of his fragile prints from Pau to Scotland, the Daily Scotsman of 26 December 1859 wrote:
Several of his photographs were included in an 1858 volume of Pyrenean views entitled Vues, costumes et monuments des Pyrénées, copies de grands maîtres.
Société Ramond
In 1864 Maxwell-Lyte was among the founders of the Société RamondSociété Ramond
The Société Ramond is a French learned society devoted to the study of the Pyrenees. It is named after the French politician, geologist, botanist and explorer Louis Ramond de Carbonnières and is based in Bagnères-de-Bigorre.-Founding:...
, a learned society devoted to the ethnographic and scientific study of the Pyrenees. Although he did not take part in the initial meeting at the hôtel des Voyageurs in Gavarnie attended by Henry Russell
Henry Russell (explorer)
Henry Patrick Marie, Count Russell-Killough was one of the pioneers of Pyrenean exploration, known for his obsession with the Vignemale.-Early life:...
, Charles Packe
Charles Packe
Charles Packe was an English lawyer and explorer who is noted for his travels in and writing about the Pyrenees.-Family:Packe was born in 1826, the oldest son of Edmund Packe, a captain in the Royal Horse Guards.-Pyrenees:...
, and Émilien Frossard and his two sons, he attended the second meeting at Frossard's house in Bagnères-de-Bigorre. At this meeting the rules for admittance were laid down, the society was given its name, and executive positions were decided upon; Maxwell-Lyte was chosen as the society's first vice-president. It was on the initiative of the Société Ramond that the observatory on the Pic du Midi de Bigorre
Pic du Midi de Bigorre
The Pic du Midi de Bigorre or simply Pic du Midi is a mountain in the French Pyrenees famous for its astronomical observatory, the Observatoire du Pic du Midi de Bigorre , part of the Observatoire Midi-Pyrénées .-Pic du Midi Observatory:Construction of the observatory began in 1878 under the...
was built. Before its construction, Maxwell-Lyte had carried out observations with a large telescope, and made photographs of the eclipse
Eclipse
An eclipse is an astronomical event that occurs when an astronomical object is temporarily obscured, either by passing into the shadow of another body or by having another body pass between it and the viewer...
of the sun of 18 July 1860. He also made meteorological readings, determining the average temperature of Bagnères-de-Bigorre over two years of recordings.
Later years
Maxwell-Lyte gave up photography when he moved with his family to DaxDax, Landes
Dax is a commune in Aquitaine in south-western France, sub-prefecture of the Landes department.It is particularly famous as a spa, specialising in mud treatment for rheumatism and similar ailments....
. Returning to his original profession as a mining engineer, he bought the sulphur springs of Moudang and a salt mine in Dax, but these were failures. He died suddenly in 1906 at his residence at 60 Finborough Road, South Kensington
South Kensington
South Kensington is a district in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London. It is a built-up area located 2.4 miles west south-west of Charing Cross....
, London, and was buried at St Mary the Boltons
St Mary the Boltons
St Mary the Boltons is an Anglican church in The Boltons, Brompton, London. It is a Grade II listed building.-History:The Boltons, a street in Brompton, was farmland until the middle of the 19th century. As part of westward expansion of London the land was developed by Robert Gunter the...
, Kensington
Kensington
Kensington is a district of west and central London, England within the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. An affluent and densely-populated area, its commercial heart is Kensington High Street, and it contains the well-known museum district of South Kensington.To the north, Kensington is...
. In its review of the year 1906, the British Journal of Photography noted his death and offered the following estimation of his contribution to photographic processing: