About This Image

An early image of Columbia University, then called Columbia College, and its building on Church St (and later Park Place, in construction in the photo), just before the college moved uptown to new quarters on 50th St and Madison Ave. Walker worked in Matthew Brady's studio in 1856, and later became Chief Photographer of the Treasury Dept. where he worked for 23 years until his death.

"Columbia College, NY" inscribed twice in pencil and ink verso.

A similar image of the same site is reproduced in Lindsay Bradford's "The Columbia Historical Portrait of New York," Doubleday & Co., NY, 1953, page 256. That image is of a print by H. H. Snelling from a negative by L. E. Walker.

In addition, a similar version of the same scene by L.E. Walker is in the holdings of the Columbia University Library.