Mathew B. Brady
- Also known as
- Mathew Brady
- M. B. Brady
- Born
- Lake George, New York, United States
- Active in
- Washington, District of Columbia, United States
- Biography
Mathew Brady was born near Lake George, New York, in 1823. He studied art with William Page and learned how to make dauguerreotypes from Page's friend, Samuel F. B. Morse. Brady opened his first portrait studio in New York City in 1844 where he photographed such notable and distinguished figures as Abraham Lincoln, Walt Whitman, and P. T. Barnum. He was the first photographer to record the Civil War, from 1861 to 1865. He directed a large staff of photographers from his Washington, DC headquarters, which necessitated his skills as a historian, perhaps his greatest contribution to the Civil War. Despite his association with the important individuals of his day, Brady died penniless in New York in 1896.
National Museum of American Art (CD-ROM) (New York and Washington D.C.: MacMillan Digital in cooperation with the National Museum of American Art, 1996)