Just a few years after Susan B. Anthony and others organized the first Women’s Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, NY in 1848, women began working as photographers in the United States. While many took over their father’s or husband’s photography studio upon their loved ones’ deaths as a means of survival, many turned to the field as a form of artistic expression. Several focused on taking women’s portraits, as ladies often felt more comfortable sitting for other women. Women photographers began moving westward, looking for opportunity and new areas in which to serve. Others fell in love with the field, striving to learn and grow as practitioners.
Maud Davis would become one of these early practitioners. Little is known of her early life. Born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1861 and the daughter of Judge Davis of Deer Lodge, Montana, she met older Englishman Thomas C. Baker who had come West somewhere along the way, and married. They ended up in Helena, Montana in the late 1880s with their two children Thomas and daughter Viroque, where he served as secretary of the Buskett Mercantile Comany in Granite before dying of spinal meningitis. Mrs. Baker took an active interest in the arts, attending women’s meetings, hosting them, and taking a strong interest in politics. In 1894, the Democratic County Convention in Lewis and Clarke County nominated her for superintendent of schools. After losing in November, she was elected enrolling clerk of the Montana State Legislature, serving for a short time before discovering a new love, photography. Continue reading
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