Leavitt Hunt - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Colonel

Colonel , abbreviated Col or COL, is a military rank of a senior commissioned officer. It or a corresponding rank exists in most armies and in many air forces; the naval equivalent rank is generally "Captain". It is also used in some police forces and other paramilitary rank structures...

Leavitt Hunt (1831–February 16, 1907) was a Harvard-educated attorney and photography pioneer who was one of the first people to photograph the Middle East

Middle East

The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...

. He and a companion, Nathan Flint Baker, traveled to Egypt

Egypt

Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...

, the Holy Land

Holy Land

The Holy Land is a term which in Judaism refers to the Kingdom of Israel as defined in the Tanakh. For Jews, the Land's identifiction of being Holy is defined in Judaism by its differentiation from other lands by virtue of the practice of Judaism often possible only in the Land of Israel...

, Lebanon

Lebanon

Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...

, Turkey

Turkey

Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

and Greece

Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

on a Grand Tour

Grand Tour

The Grand Tour was the traditional trip of Europe undertaken by mainly upper-class European young men of means. The custom flourished from about 1660 until the advent of large-scale rail transit in the 1840s, and was associated with a standard itinerary. It served as an educational rite of passage...

in 1851–52, making one of the earliest photographic records of the Arab and ancient worlds, including the Great Sphinx and the Great Pyramid of Giza

Great Pyramid of Giza

The Great Pyramid of Giza is the oldest and largest of the three pyramids in the Giza Necropolis bordering what is now El Giza, Egypt. It is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and the only one to remain largely intact...

, views along the Nile River, the ruins at Petra

Petra

Petra is a historical and archaeological city in the Jordanian governorate of Ma'an that is famous for its rock cut architecture and water conduits system. Established sometime around the 6th century BC as the capital city of the Nabataeans, it is a symbol of Jordan as well as its most visited...

and the Parthenon

Parthenon

The Parthenon is a temple on the Athenian Acropolis, Greece, dedicated to the Greek goddess Athena, whom the people of Athens considered their virgin patron. Its construction began in 447 BC when the Athenian Empire was at the height of its power. It was completed in 438 BC, although...

in Greece.

Biography

The youngest son of General

General

A general officer is an officer of high military rank, usually in the army, and in some nations, the air force. The term is widely used by many nations of the world, and when a country uses a different term, there is an equivalent title given....

Jonathan Hunt

Jonathan Hunt (Vermont Representative)

General Jonathan Hunt was a member of the United States House of Representatives and the prominent Hunt family of Vermont. He was born in Vernon, Windham County, Vermont, and graduated from Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, in 1807. Afterwards, Hunt studied law and was admitted to the bar...

of Vermont and the former Jane Maria Leavitt

Thaddeus Leavitt

Thaddeus Leavitt was a Suffield, Connecticut, merchant who invented an early cotton gin, as well as joining with seven other Connecticut men to purchase most of the three-million-plus acres of the Western Reserve lands in Ohio from the government of Connecticut, land on which some of his family...

, and brother to architect Richard Morris Hunt

Richard Morris Hunt

Richard Morris Hunt was an American architect of the nineteenth century and a preeminent figure in the history of American architecture...

and painter William Morris Hunt

William Morris Hunt

William Morris Hunt , American painter, was born at Brattleboro, Vermont to Jane Maria Hunt and Hon. Jonathan Hunt, who raised one of the preeminent families in American art...

,The fourth brother was Jonathan Leavitt, a graduate of the University of Paris who became a medical doctor in Paris. Like his brother, painter William Morris Hunt, Jonathan Hunt was an apparent suicide, at age forty-nine in Paris Leavitt Hunt was born in Brattleboro, Vermont

Brattleboro, Vermont

Brattleboro, originally Brattleborough, is a town in Windham County, Vermont, United States, located in the southeast corner of the state, along the state line with New Hampshire. The population was 12,046 at the 2010 census...

, but grew up in 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...

following the early death of his father Jonathan Hunt

Jonathan Hunt (Vermont Representative)

, a Vermont Congressman whose father had been the state's Lieutenant Governor

Jonathan Hunt (Vermont lieutenant Governor)

Jonathan Hunt was born in Northampton, Massachusetts, the son of Capt. Samuel Strong Hunt of Northampton and Ann Ellsworth of Windsor, Ct., and the great-great-grandson of Jonathan Hunt and his wife Mary Webster, daughter of Governor John Webster of the Connecticut Colony...

.

Leavitt Hunt attended the Boston Latin School

Boston Latin School

The Boston Latin School is a public exam school founded on April 23, 1635, in Boston, Massachusetts. It is both the first public school and oldest existing school in the United States....

, and subsequently enrolled in a Swiss boarding school, finally taking a law degree from the University of Heidelberg. He then enrolled at the Swiss Military Academy in Thun

Thun

Thun is a municipality in the administrative district of Thun in the canton of Bern in Switzerland with about 42,136 inhabitants , as of 1 January 2006....

. Hunt was a scholar: he was fluent in French, German, Italian, Latin, Greek and Hebrew, and could write in both Persian

Persian language

Persian is an Iranian language within the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. It is primarily spoken in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and countries which historically came under Persian influence...

and Sanskrit

Sanskrit

Sanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...

.Known as the scholar in the family, Hunt was offered a professorship at Princeton, then known as the College of New Jersey, but turned it down in favor of his interests in the law, travel and the arts.

Hunt's companion on his Middle Eastern journey was a wealthy sculptor from Ohio and friend of the Hunt family. Nathan Flint Baker had been travelling in Europe for a decade, and announced his intention to travel through the Middle East. Hunt decided to join him, meeting him in Florence, Italy, in late September 1851.

Hunt and Baker spent several weeks in Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

practicing photography, and then sailed from Naples

Naples

Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...

to Malta

Malta

Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...

and eventually up the Nile River into the Sinai Peninsula

Sinai Peninsula

The Sinai Peninsula or Sinai is a triangular peninsula in Egypt about in area. It is situated between the Mediterranean Sea to the north, and the Red Sea to the south, and is the only part of Egyptian territory located in Asia as opposed to Africa, effectively serving as a land bridge between two...

, to Petra

Petra

(where they were among the first to photograph the ruins), then on to Jerusalem, to what is today Lebanon

Lebanon

, then on to Constantinople

Constantinople

Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...

and Athens

Athens

Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...

, before returning to Paris in May 1852.

Hunt's and Baker's photographs were dazzling, especially for a brand-new medium many had never seen before. They photographed the Great Sphinx and the Pyramids at Giza, the templex complex at Karnak

Karnak

The Karnak Temple Complex—usually called Karnak—comprises a vast mix of decayed temples, chapels, pylons, and other buildings, notably the Great Temple of Amun and a massive structure begun by Pharaoh Ramses II . Sacred Lake is part of the site as well. It is located near Luxor, some...

, the Ramesseum

Ramesseum

The Ramesseum is the memorial temple of Pharaoh Ramesses II . It is located in the Theban necropolis in Upper Egypt, across the River Nile from the modern city of Luxor...

at Thebes

Thebes, Egypt

Thebes is the Greek name for a city in Ancient Egypt located about 800 km south of the Mediterranean, on the east bank of the river Nile within the modern city of Luxor. The Theban Necropolis is situated nearby on the west bank of the Nile.-History:...

, and the ruins on the Island of Philae

Philae

Philae is an island in the Nile River and the previous site of an Ancient Egyptian temple complex in southern Egypt...

. They travelled farther to photograph the Monastery of St. Catherine at Mount Sinai

Mount Sinai

Mount Sinai , also known as Mount Horeb, Mount Musa, Gabal Musa , Jabal Musa meaning "Moses' Mountain", is a mountain near Saint Catherine in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt. A mountain called Mount Sinai is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus in the Torah and the Bible as well as the Quran...

, the tombs and temples of Petra, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre

Church of the Holy Sepulchre

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, also called the Church of the Resurrection by Eastern Christians, is a church within the walled Old City of Jerusalem. It is a few steps away from the Muristan....

in Jerusalem, the ruins at Baalbek

Baalbek

Baalbek is a town in the Beqaa Valley of Lebanon, altitude , situated east of the Litani River. It is famous for its exquisitely detailed yet monumentally scaled temple ruins of the Roman period, when Baalbek, then known as Heliopolis, was one of the largest sanctuaries in the Empire...

, and finally the buildings of the Acropolis

Acropolis

Acropolis means "high city" in Greek, literally city on the extremity and is usually translated into English as Citadel . For purposes of defense, early people naturally chose elevated ground to build a new settlement, frequently a hill with precipitous sides...

in Athens.

The 60 extant photographs from their journey show that Hunt and Baker were keen on the new medium and familiar with its techniques. It was a real partnership: both men brought their own strengths to the process, and images that survive demonstrate their aesthetic acumen as well as their journalistic desire to show the settings in which they worked. One image of an unveiled Ghawazee

Ghawazee

The Ghawazi dancers of Egypt were a group of female traveling dancers of the Nawari people, a subgroup of the Dom people, sometimes referred to as "Gypsies"....

female dancer, signed on the negative by Hunt himself, is likely the earliest photographic portrait of a Middle Eastern woman. Another image of the less photogenic view from the rear of the Parthenon

Parthenon

demonstrates two men unafraid to indulge their take on a revered landmark.

The trip was a logistical challenge. Accompanying the two travelers for part of the journey were Leavitt Hunt's older brother, the architect Richard Morris Hunt, and two other friends. The group hired a dahaheahA dahaheah was a large houseboat with triangular cross-sails. The rear of the boat sported a cabin, where the chartering party could sleep. Typically, they took their meals on the roof of the cabin under a large awning. This means of conveyance was typically used by English and other foreign tourists on the Nile in the nineteenth century. The crew consisted of a dozen or more men, who cooked, captained the vessel and shopped in the bazaars for supplies. and a crew of 13 Egyptians to take them down the Nile River. Architect Hunt, later famous for his Gilded Age

Gilded Age

In United States history, the Gilded Age refers to the era of rapid economic and population growth in the United States during the post–Civil War and post-Reconstruction eras of the late 19th century. The term "Gilded Age" was coined by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner in their book The Gilded...

Newport palazzos, painted and made sketches along the Nile while his younger brother and Baker took photographs. (The results were later shown at a 1999 exhibition in Washington, D.C.)

Following their arduous journey, the pair of no-longer-neophyte photographers returned to Paris and made prints from their 18x24 cm negatives which were made using a waxed-paper process. Having developed the negatives, each man kept a personal album of the prints. The young Hunt showed his to the German naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt

Alexander von Humboldt

Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander Freiherr von Humboldt was a German naturalist and explorer, and the younger brother of the Prussian minister, philosopher and linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt...

, who brought them to the attention of the King of Prussia

Frederick William IV of Prussia

|align=right|Upon his accession, he toned down the reactionary policies enacted by his father, easing press censorship and promising to enact a constitution at some point, but he refused to enact a popular legislative assembly, preferring to work with the aristocracy through "united committees" of...

, and Hunt made a formal gift of 11 prints to Karl Richard Lepsius

Karl Richard Lepsius

Karl Richard Lepsius was a pioneering Prussian Egyptologist and linguist and pioneer of modern archaeology.-Background:...

, the German founder of the study of ancient Egyptology. Baker left his album with a New York dealer to discern commercial interest in the prints.

Following their extraordinary journey, the two men took divergent paths. Baker returned to Cincinnati, Ohio

Cincinnati, Ohio

Cincinnati is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio. Cincinnati is the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located to north of the Ohio River at the Ohio-Kentucky border, near Indiana. The population within city limits is 296,943 according to the 2010 census, making it Ohio's...

, to enjoy the life of a wealthy aesthete, while Hunt completed his studies at the Swiss Military Institute, then returned to America where he took a second law degree, this one from Harvard. He began practicing law in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

, the home of his brother Richard Morris Hunt, until the outbreak of the American Civil War

American Civil War

The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

, when he enlisted as lieutenant on the staff of General Heintzelman

Samuel P. Heintzelman

Samuel Peter Heintzelman was a United States Army General. He served in the Seminole War, the Mexican-American War, the Yuma War, the Cortina Troubles, and the American Civil War, rising to the command of a corps....

. Eventually he was promoted to lieutenant colonel for bravery at the Battle of Malvern Hill

Battle of Malvern Hill

The Battle of Malvern Hill, also known as the Battle of Poindexter's Farm, took place on July 1, 1862, in Henrico County, Virginia, on the seventh and last day of the Seven Days Battles of the American Civil War. Gen. Robert E. Lee launched a series of disjointed assaults on the nearly impregnable...

. Hunt subsequently attained the rank of full colonel

Colonel

and assistant adjutant general

Adjutant general

An Adjutant General is a military chief administrative officer.-Imperial Russia:In Imperial Russia, the General-Adjutant was a Court officer, who was usually an army general. He served as a personal aide to the Tsar and hence was a member of the H. I. M. Retinue...

in the Union Army

Union Army

The Union Army was the land force that fought for the Union during the American Civil War. It was also known as the Federal Army, the U.S. Army, the Northern Army and the National Army...

.

Following the Civil War, Leavitt Hunt returned to New York City and his law practice for several years, until he retired in 1867 to Weathersfield, Vermont

Weathersfield, Vermont

Weathersfield is a town in Windsor County, Vermont, United States. The population was 2,788 at the 2000 census.-Geography:According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 44.2 square miles , of which 43.8 square miles is land and 0.4 square mile is...

, where his wife Katherine Jarvis had inherited the estate belonging to her father William Jarvis

William Jarvis (merchant)

William Jarvis was an American diplomat, financier and philanthropist best known for introducing the merino breed of sheep into the United States from Spain.-Biography:...

, a prominent Vermont businessman and diplomat best known as the first importer of Merino sheep into America.

Leavitt Hunt purchased his own estate at nearby Weathersfield Bow and became a gentleman farmer. Hunt was particularly interested in the rare breeds of Dutch cattle that he raised, as well as the white pine forests he propagated on his estate, which he dubbed Elmsholme. During his retirement as a farmer, Hunt also became an inventor, with several patents for new plows.

As far as is known, neither Hunt nor his companion Baker ever showed much interest in the photographic medium after their journey. Their prints are rarely seen, very scarce, and are among the most valuable early photographic images. Hunt's personal album is now in the collection of the Bennington Art Museum, Bennington, Vermont. Baker's album evidently disappeared. The collection of photos presented to Eygptologist Richard Lepsius is housed at the Museum Ludwig

Museum Ludwig

Museum Ludwig, located in Cologne, Germany, houses a collection of modern art. It includes works from PopArt, Abstract and Surrealism, and has one of the largest Picasso collections in Europe. It also features many works by Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein....

's AgfaPhoto

AgfaPhoto

AgfaPhoto GmbH is a European photographic company, formed in 2004 when Agfa-Gevaert sold their Consumer Imaging division. Agfa had for many years been well known as a producer of consumer-oriented photographic products including films, photographic papers and cameras...

-Historama in Cologne, Germany.

Hunt's personal negatives are believed lost, but the prints he made became the property of his brother Richard Morris Hunt. They are now preserved in the Richard Morris Hunt Papers at the American Architectural Foundation in Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

A 1999 show at the American Architectural Foundation's Octagon Museum showcased Leavitt Hunt's 1853 journey. Entitled "A Voyage of Discovery: The Nile Journal of Richard Morris Hunt", the exhibition consisted of seventy of Leavitt Hunt's original photographic prints, as well as drawings and watercolors by Richard Morris Hunt from the museum's Prints and Drawings Collection.

Some of Leavitt Hunt's personal prints were donated by his family after his death to the Library of Congress

Library of Congress

The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...

, where they are part of the permanent photographic collection. There are also a few original prints from this early Middle East trip in the Hallmark Photographic Collection

Hallmark Photographic Collection

The Hallmark Photographic Collection was amassed by Hallmark Cards, Inc..It was donated to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Missouri in December 2005...

and at the George Eastman House

George Eastman House

The George Eastman House is the world's oldest museum dedicated to photography and one of the world's oldest film archives, opened to the public in 1949 in Rochester, New York, USA. World-renowned for its photograph and motion picture archives, the museum is also a leader in film preservation and...

in Rochester, New York

Rochester, New York

Rochester is a city in Monroe County, New York, south of Lake Ontario in the United States. Known as The World's Image Centre, it was also once known as The Flour City, and more recently as The Flower City...

. Harvard University

Harvard University

Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

's Harrison D. Horblit Collection of Early Photography also owns several of the works by Hunt and Baker.

Although Leavitt Hunt never returned to photography, he remained vitally interested in the arts until the end of his life, corresponding with fellow Harvard-educated lawyer and author Henry Dwight Sedgwick

Henry Dwight Sedgwick

Henry Dwight Sedgwick III was an American lawyer and author.-Early life and career:Sedgwick was in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, the second child of Henry Dwight Sedgwick II and Henrietta Ellery . On his paternal grandmother's side, he was part of the New England Dwight family...

, as well as other intellectuals of the era. He and his wife travelled frequently, often crossing paths with family friends like Joseph Hodges Choate

Joseph Hodges Choate

Joseph Hodges Choate , was an American lawyer and diplomat.-Biography:He was born in Salem, Massachusetts on January 24, 1832. He was the son of physician George Choate and the brother of George C. S. Choate. His father's first cousin was Rufus Choate...

and Thomas Jefferson Coolidge. He also wrote poetry on the side.

Perhaps the highest tribute paid Leavitt Hunt and his brothers was that of Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, lecturer, and poet, who led the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century...

. "The remarkable families", Emerson wrote, were "the three Jackson brothers....the three Lowell brothers....the four Lawrences....the Cabots....the three Hunts, William, Richard and Leavitt (William Hunt tells also of his brother John, in Paris); the Washburns, three governors, I believe."

Clyde du Vernet Hunt, who graduated from Andover and Harvard Law School

Harvard Law School

Harvard Law School is one of the professional graduate schools of Harvard University. Located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it is the oldest continually-operating law school in the United States and is home to the largest academic law library in the world. The school is routinely ranked by the U.S...

, and subsequently became a painter and sculptor accepted by the Paris Salon, was the son of Leavitt Hunt and his wife, the former Katherine Jarvis. A portrait of Leavitt Hunt painted by his brother William Morris Hunt in 1874 is in the permanent collection of the Brooks Memorial Library, Brattleboro's main library. Artist William Morris Hunt sketched other members of his brother Leavitt's family as well. Jarvis Hunt

Jarvis Hunt

Jarvis Hunt was a "renowned Chicago architect" who designed a wide array of buildings, including train stations, suburban estates, industrial buildings, clubhouses and other structures....

, another son of Col. Hunt and his wife, became a noted Chicago architect.

Leavitt Hunt's wife Katherine, daughter of businessman William Jarvis, died June 6, 1916, at Lakewood, New Jersey, and was interred with her husband at Weathersfield. Leavitt Hunt predeceased his wife, dying at Weathersfield on February 16, 1907. The couple's infant son Morris Hunt, who died in 1871, is interred with his parents.

External links

Great Pyramid and Sphinx, Gizeh, Egypt, Calotpye print, ca. 1852, Leavitt Hunt, Prints & Photographs Reading Room, The Library of Congress, www.loc.gov.rr
Agrippa; or, The Evangelists: Historical Point of View, Leavitt Hunt, Miller & Curtis, New York, 1857

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Biography

See also

Further reading

External links