In 1853 Richard Hovendon Kern was hired as topographer and artist for a government-sponsored reconnaissance led by Captain John Williams Gunnison. Kern sketched landscape panoramas as the group made its way from St. Louis toward San Francisco. When the expedition reached Sevier Lake, Utah, however, it was attacked by a band of Indians. Seven men, including Kern and Gunnison, were killed, and Kern's drawings were stolen. The sketches were soon recovered and eventually carried to Washington, D.C.
Robert Shlaer, an accomplished daguerreotypist, came across Kern's sketches many years later at the Newberry Library in Chicago. He was inspired to locate the views depicted in the drawings and to photograph them, as nearly as was possible, from the same spot where Kern had stood when he sketched them. This collection juxtaposes Kern's drawings with Shlaer's photographs, presenting 389 illustrations in geographic sequence from east to west
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| Title | Alternative Title | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  | Plate 238 | Side valley of Grand River, composite sketch and photograph |
| 2 |  | Plate 103 | Sierra Blanca photograph |
| 3 |  | Plate 106 | San Juan Mountains panoramic photographs |
| 4 |  | Plate 113 | Sierra Blanca, photograph |
| 5 |  | Plate 117 | Panoramic photograph, Sierra Blanca |
| 6 |  | Plate 12 | Junction of the Smoky Hill and Republican river |
| 7 |  | Plate 120 | Photograph of Poncha Pass |
| 8 |  | Plate 124 | Rocky Mountains, panoramic photograph |
| 9 |  | Plate 127 | Entrance to Coochutoke Pass, photograph |
| 10 |  | Plate 130 | Entrance to Del Norte, photograph |
| 11 |  | Plate 134 | Sahwatch Mountains, panoramic photograph |
| 12 |  | Plate 139 | Coo-che-to-pa Pass, photograph |
| 13 |  | Plate 143 | Stock yard near summit of Coo-che-to-pa Pass, photograph |
| 14 |  | Plate 146 | Coo-che-to-pa Pass, leaving Sawatch Creek, photograph |
| 15 |  | Plate 151 | Photograph of the approach to Cochetopa Pass up the canyon of East Pass Creek on 1 September 1853. |
| 16 |  | Plate 158 | Daguerreotype of cliff in Cochetopa Pass. |
| 17 |  | Plate 159 | In Cochetopa Pass, photograph |
| 18 |  | Plate 162 | View to the east from Cochetopa Pass, Sept. 2, photograph. |
| 19 |  | Plate 165 | West end of Coo-che-to-pa Pass on Pass Creek, photograph |
| 20 |  | Plate 168 | Pass Creek, photograph |
| 21 |  | Plate 171 | West of summit in Cochetopa Pass, photograph |
| 22 |  | Plate 175 | Divide between the waters of the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean, photographs |
| 23 |  | Plate 179 | The Valley of Cochetopa (today Tomichi) Creek, photograph |
| 24 |  | Plate 183 | Divide between the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean, photograph |
| 25 |  | Plate 19 | Bent's Fort (reconstruction), photograph |