Miss Rehan as “Jenny O. Jones” in Red Letter Nights. Sarony, Napoleon  (American, 1821-1896)

In advertisements in the Philadelphia Photographer (1886), placed by Ernest Edwards for his new company in New York City, The Photo-Gravure Company, he stated that he used ÒThe process of Mr. Ignatz Oesterreicher.Ó Mr. Oesterreicher is not listed in any history and in searching the internet his name came up only as a defendant in one lawsuit and as the plaintiff in another. Ernest Edwards in a short article in Anthony’s Photographic Bulletin, 1889, (pg. 172) discussed various methods of photomechanical printing including photogravure. He briefly outlined the method of using an aquatint grain on a copper plate with an exposed bichromated layer above to act as a resist. The description is basically the Talbot-Klič method, but not discussing the use of a carbon tissue. It may be that the Oesterreicher method was just a way of circumventing ownership of a license to use the Klič method.

References

Hanson, David Checklist of photomechanical processes and printing 1825-1910, 2017 p. 101