Extent and Medium of Descriptive Unit
241 photo negatives : B&W ; silver gelatin dry plate (glass negatives)
Administrative History Biographical Sketch
The photographer who took these photographs was most likely to have been George Nealon Babbitt. Born in Fredericton on 17 March 1842 to Samuel W Babbitt (formerly manager of the Central Bank and later of the People's Bank of NB, both in Fredericton) and Francis Marie (or Maria) Babbitt. George N. was employed by the province for 55 years: first as a clerk in Crown Land office in 1860. then transferred to Provincial Secretary's department under Leonard Tilley. Post confederation, he went to the Receiver General's department under John A Beckwith and then eventually became the Deputy Receiver General about 1883. At the time of his death in 1915 he was called "the oldest employee in the provincial civil service". His services for each being rewarded when he was made a companion of the Imperial Service Order (an honour received from King Edward VII on 27 June 1908), he was shortly afterwards presented with the Imperial Service Order medal which he wore on special occasions.
George was for several years an alderman representing Kings Ward and was also a director of the People's Bank. His service during the Fenian Raids merited his receiving the Fenian Raid medal and bounty. He was a temperance advocate, having been a member of the old Temperance Reform Club. He was also a prominent cricketer in Fredericton and an officer of the Fredericton Cricket Club for years as well as having ben a patron of the Fredericton Tennis Club. He was also an officer of the Automobile and Boating Club. He was "one of the most efficient amateur photographers, having taken many splendid pictures of several public buildings in this city". (The Daily Gleaner 12 April 1915, page 3).
On 5 November 1868, George N. married Annie L. Wetmore, youngest daughter of Stephen P. Wetmore of Carleton (Saint John County).
G.N. Babbitt is known to have been dabbling in photography at least as early as 1864: carpenter Charles Moffitt noted in his 1864 diary that he built a camera for George N. Babbitt. One of the Babbitt family albums that is part of the MC300 collection (with images dating 1896-1898) was definitely owned by one of George's sons, S.W. Babbitt, so it is at least possible that he was a photographer, as well.
GN Babbitt was a veteran of the Fenian Raid campaign (that is, repelling the Fenians), one of 42 members of "the company that left Fredericton on the 10th April 1866 to withstand the Fenian Raid on the border" (NB Reporter and Fredericton Advertiser for 15 April 1896).
Working with his partner, Harry D. White (watch-maker turned electrician), George N developed and operated Fredericton's first X-ray machine right in his own home at 311 University Avenue. Before the Victoria Public Hospital had an X-ray machine, afflicted people would visit George and Harry D. White, for an X-ray. The X-ray images printed by White and Babbitt would then be taken to the hospital so the patient could get the appropriate treatment. In at least one instance, a woman came from Saint John to have an X-ray at Babbitt's house. GN Babbitt operated the hospital's X-ray machine (once it was procured on the advice of GN and Harry D. White) free of charge until his death in 1915. It seems that Babbitt likely kept up his photography through until the end of his life: his obituary mentions that he was a photographer and some of the later photos in this collection and other Babbitt albums are dated at least as late as circa 1905.
The Babbitt family had many inventive and ingenious members: George N. Babbitt's brother, John Babbitt, was a watchmaker and amateur inventor. John's experiments were not mentioned in his obituary, so Dr. LW Bailey (his creative partner and close neighbour) took it upon himself to memorialize Babbitt's accomplishments in the University magazine shortly after his death. One of John's "inventions" was a version of a telephone built from descriptions he had read of Bell's devices in an American scientific magazine. Built about 1880, John installed one in his residence at University Avenue and Charlotte Street and the other in the residence of his friend, DR LW Bailey, also on University Avenue. According to The Daily Gleaner for 13 December 1952 page 5, John's early device was then in the possession of the NB Telephone Company's Museum in Saint John. Also notable is that John seems to have produced the first sound recordings ever created in the province. An April 23, 1878, notice in The Daily Times mentioned "a phonograph invented by Mr. John Babbit, of this city". The same note clarifies that "Some few months since Mr. B read in an American paper a description of the instrument, and he conceived the idea of making one himself, and he has succeeded beyond his most sanguine expectation. He has now completed a 'speaking phonograph,' and can reproduce any description of sounds, conversations, singing, &c. It is very simple and very wonderful".
Two other relevant clippings support the idea of John's precedence as the earliest sound recordist in NB:
The Agriculturalist, 27 April 1878, p. 2
The wonderfully acute Fredericton correspondent of the Telegraph has at last found something really note-worthy. He declares that Mr. John Babbitt of this city is the inventor of a speaking phonograph. This would be news to Mr. Babbitt and Mr. Edison. We scarcely know whether to congratulate Fredericton most warmly on the possession of its inventive phonographist, or its equally inventive Telegraph correspondent. The fact is that Mr. Babbitt does not claim to be the “inventor”, but having seen a cut of it very ingeniously constructed a successful working instrument which has been seen and experimented upon by many of his townsmen.
The Agriculturalist, 13 July 1878, p. 2
The “Phonograph” has been on exhibition for a day or two in the City Hall. The enterprise is conducted by two gentlemen from Boston. The invention which is really wonderful does not attract so much attention as it otherwise would, from the fact that the ready genius and practical skill of Mr. John Babbitt, has already familiarized many of our citizens with the machine. Mr. Babbitt’s Phonograph is fully equal to the newcomer.
One of George N. and Annie L. Babbitt's children was Bessie Louise Babbitt, a graduate of the Provincial Normal School, schoolteacher, and later nurse (graduate of Newport, RI, School of Nursing). Bessie served overseas in WWI as a nursing sister and was head nurse of the DSCR Hospital in Fredericton at the end of that war. She also served in the Jordan Memorial Hospital (Sanatorium) and had considerable nursing experience in the U.S. She was a member of the Ministering Circle, Kings Daughters, and a one-time IODE member. Source: The Daily Gleaner 11 July 1950, page 12.
Custodial History
Unknown source of acquisition unless they were part of the large collection of negatives amassed by Lord Beaverbrook and known then simply as the Beaverbrook Negatives.
Scope and Content
Photos in this fonds show Fredericton scenes, especially of college hill (UNB), Waterloo Row, Porcupine Lodge, Maryland Hill, Queens Square, Nashwaak, Forest Hill, Cedar Lodge, Christ Church Cathedral, Baker Brook, French Lake and French Island, Portobello, Blackville, and Marysville, as well as the aftermath of a tornado at Barony, Moose, canoeing, fishing, camping, the Marysville Cotton Mill (Alex Gibson Mill), house interiors, boats, and Babbitt family portraits.