William Henry Jackson (1843-1942)

William Henry Jackson was born in 1843 in New York.  His mother was a painter and with her instruction, he began painting at a young age. His first job was retouching photographs in a studio where he learned about the new art of photography.

He joined the Army during the Civil War and spent his spare time making sketches of military life. He was at Gettysburg, but did not see combat. These sketches, which his mother saved, are one of the best documentations of military life during the Civil War.

Following the war he became very successful in the photo business and was engaged to a woman from a prominent family. The engagement ended in 1866 and a broken-hearted Jackson took the advice of Horace Greely and went west. He worked as a bullwhacker, a driver of oxen, for a mining company along the Oregon Trail.  He continued to sketch the land, people and activities he encountered and soon came to realize that his life’s work would be documenting the changing American West.

Jackson opened a photo studio in Omaha in 1868. His work photographing the construction of the Union Pacific railroad included images of Yellowstone, and his photos were instrumental in Congress deciding to make Yellowstone the first National Park in 1872. Jackson continued to photograph the west and in 1878 moved his studio to Denver. He continued working into his eighties, when he decided to go back to painting. He painted the west he had photographed until his death in 1942 at the age of 99.

William Henry Jackson was one of the greatest photographers of the American West. A photograph by him would be a priceless addition to any collection.

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