RARE CDV VIEW OF MORMON-BUILT DEVIL'S GATE BRIDGE IN WEBER CANYON ON THE TRANSCONTINENTAL RAILROAD

No. 6. Devil's Gate Bridge, Weber Canyon.  Albumen carte de visite (CDV). Salt Lake City, Utah: C.W. Carter, circa 1869. Title printed to mount recto. Carter's illustrated imprint to verso. 

In 1868, Brigham Young contracted with Union Pacific to construct a portion of the transcontinental railroad through Weber Canyon. The Devil's Gate Bridge was completed in 1869, with the name referencing the nearby Devil's Slide rock formation. 

Charles Carter (1832-1918) first learned the photographic arts in the British Army. After his conversion to Mormonism, he moved to Salt Lake City in 1859 and joined the studio of fellow Mormon Charles Roscoe Savage. He opened his own enterprise shortly afterwards, catering to the Mormon community with views of Mormon pioneers, Utah scenes, and the Mormon contributions to the transcontinental railway as in this view, extremely scarce in the CDV format. Notably, Carter's imprint features an engraved illustration of the Salt Lake Tabernacle constructed between 1863 and 18765. 

[Photography, Early Photography, Historic Photography, Daguerreotypes, Ambrotypes, Tintypes, Cased Images, Union Cases, Albumen Photographs, CDVs, Carte de Visites, Cartes de Visite, Carte-de-visite, Cartes-de-visite, CDV, Cabinet Cards, Stereoviews, Stereocards, Stereographs] [Western Americana, Western History, Western Expansion, Wild West] [Mormon, Mormonism, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Utah, Utah Territory, Nauvoo, Joseph Smith, Brigham Young]