John Reid (1835-1911), the photographer, was born in Scotland and came to the U.S. around 1841. As an apprentice to the Rogers Locomotive Works, he and his family moved to Paterson, New Jersey. He became interested in daguerreotype pictures. By 1857 he was sharing an office with his brother, Alexander, who was a dentist – A. & J. Reid, with John having taken up photography. John became known as a “famous photographer of Iron Horses.” His locomotive photographs are “known” first to have been made shortly after the late 1850s origin of the business. Reid introduced the convention to taking the photographs “from a position just ahead of the smoke box.” Reid printed his own pictures, with his own rag paper and his own emulsion. The Rogers Locomotive Works (1832-1904) built the 4-4-0 locomotive type in 1855 which was known for its power and endurance. It was the most common type of American locomotive, so common that the type came to be called the “American Standard.” After the Civil War the 4-4-0 type was replaced by larger locomotives and the 4-4-0 locomotive relegated to branch or commuter lines. The steam locomotive in this photograph greatly resembles Engine No. 27 of 1860 of the New York and New Haven Railroad (1849-1872). The three railroad names printed on the photograph matte were all acquired by Cornelius Vanderbilt in the 1860s: the New York and Harlem controlled by 1863, the Hudson River Railroad purchased in 1864 and merged with the N.Y. and Harlem in 1869 to make the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, the New York and New Haven Railroad operated with that name between 1849-1871 (in 1872 it merged with Hartford and New Haven Railroad to form the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad). By 1890 stream locomotives were banned from New York City. The bridge in this photograph is a Post box-truss railroad bridge. This type of bridge is a hybrid between a Warren truss and a double-intersected Pratt truss. It was invented in 1863 by Simeon S. Post (1805-1872) of Jersey City, N.J. and occasionally referred to as a “Post patent truss” although S.S. Post never received a patent for it. This two-track railroad bridge across the Harlem River is acknowledged to have been used by the New York and Harlem, the New York Central and Hudson River, and the New York and New Haven railroads. A two-track railroad bridge across the Harlem River at Fourth Avenue (renamed in 1871 to Park Avenue) was enacted by New York State Legislature in 1841 to extend the New York & Harlem Railroad from lower Manhattan across the Harlem River into the Bronx. The original bridge was a two-track box-truss bridge composed of four 90 feet long spans: three were fixed iron spans, and one wooden swing span all supported on masonry piers but with only a seven foot clearance above water. In 1867 the wooden span was replaced by a steel draw span. The harlem Manufacturing Company of Paterson, N.J. was known to build Post box-truss bridges and is so acknowledged on the photograph’s matte. This photograph was taken definitely sometime after the 1867 installation of the steel draw span and before 1871 when Fourth Avenue was renamed to Park Avenue. Cornelius Vanderbilt had sunk the railroad tracks to enter his newly built Grand Central Terminal in New York City and the former surface track area was developed into a park-like promenade. Possibly John Reid took the photograph to record the acquisition of the three railroads into the Vanderbilt railroad empire or the installation of a new metal draw span replacing the old wooden swing span. The photographic process attributed to this print existed between 1885 and 1920. This bridge was replaced between 1891 and 1893 when a four track swing span was constructed which was again replaced in the Twentieth Century.