A short two-page article on English photographer Henry Peach Robinson including a list of books he had authored appeared in the August 5th, 1887 issue of The Photographic Times and American Photographer. This portrait by an unknown maker taken in England was used as the frontis plate for the issue. The following are the opening paragraphs to the article followed by background on the plate itself:

HENRY PEACH ROBINSON

The subject of our sketch—and the original of the admirable portrait which appears in this number of the Photographic Times—was born at Ludlow, a pleasant little town in Shropshire, England, in 1830. Here Milton wrote ” Comus” and Butler “Hudibras”; and many artists will be found to agree with Mr. Robinson’s fond dictum, that it is “the most beautiful spot in England.”
The genus loci must have had a favorable influence on Robinson; for while yet quite a lad he contributed articles and sketches to the Journal of the Archaeological Society and to the Illustrated London News. He studied art diligently, and before he came of age was an exhibitor of paintings at the Royal Academy in London; no mean honor for one so young, especially when we know that he had also devoted much time to etching, to sculpture, and to literature. It may fairly be said that to the artistic training which he enjoyed during this early period of his life, a large part of his subsequent success has been due. (1.)

GENERAL NOTES

The portrait of H. P. Robinson which accompanies this number of The Photographic Times is from a negative made in England, and reproduced in this city by the Photo-gravure Company. The highest grade photo-gravure process was employed, by which the prints are made from a copper plate engraved by photography, and printed on a copper-plate press in the ordinary way. (2.)

1. Henry Peach Robinson: in: The Photographic Times and American Photographer: Scovill Mfg. Co.: New York: Friday, August 5, 1887: p. 391
2. Ibid: General Notes: p. 393