![[Residence of Mr. Howard, San Mateo, California, with Olive Tree]](https://media.getty.edu/iiif/image/9bda5013-d245-447a-b864-35d96b299780/full/808,/0/default.jpg)
Getty Museum
[Residence of Mr. Howard, San Mateo, California, with Olive Tree]
Creator
Carleton WatkinsAmerican Photographer · 1829–1916
All works by this person →At twenty, Carleton Watkins headed out to California to make his fortune. After working as a daguerreotype operator in San Jose, he established his own practice and soon made his first visit to the Yosemite Valley. There he made thirty mammoth plate and one hundred stereograph views that were among the first photographs of Yosemite seen in the East. Partly on the strength of Watkins's photographs,
More on Getty ULAN- Date
- about 1863–1880
- Medium
- Albumen silver print
- Culture
- American
- Department
- Photographs
- Institution
- Getty Museum
The density of this enormous tree's branches conveys such monumentality that a viewer hardly notices the charming swing hanging to the right of tree trunk. This small detail reflects the changes that occurred in San Mateo County after 1863, when the railroad completed a connection between San Francisco and the farming village of San Mateo to the south. Formerly rural farms soon gave way to the country estates of California's new wealthy residents. One of those residents, a successful entrepreneur named William Howard, commissioned Carleton Watkins to photograph his lavish estate with its monumental olive tree.
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