Alfred A. Hart (1816–1908) was a 19th-century American photographer and artist who served as the official photographer for the Central Pacific Railroad.
Biography Hart was the official photographer for the Central Pacific Railroad under the patronage of Judge Edwin B. Crocker, one of the Five Associates on the Central Pacific board. Hart documented the building of the western half of the first transcontinental railroad, for which he took 364 historic stereoviews of the railroad construction in the 1860s.
When Judge Crocker resigned from the Central Pacific board after a stroke in June 1869, Hart lost his connection with the company; he was replaced by Carleton Watkins, a boyhood friend of Central Pacific vice-president Collis P. Huntington. Hart sold some of his stereoview negatives to Watkins, who later published the CPRR stereoviews in the 1870s under his own name.
References
External links Alfred A. Hart - 19th Century Photographer of the Central Pacific Railroad Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum The First Transcontinental Railroad - Alfred A. Hart photos, Stanford University Libraries , University of Nevada, Reno Library Guide to the Alfred A. Hart Photograph collection, 1862-1869 at The Bancroft Library The construction of Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) as photographed from 1864 to 1869 by Alfred A. Hart: H. C. Peterson set. Andrew Smith gallery