Object of the Month – February 2010




Stereoscope viewer: the “TV” of yesteryear

Stereoscopes were one of the most popular forms of entertainment in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The first patented stereoscope was invented by Sir Charles Wheatstone in 1838. The device was later popularized by Oliver Wendell Holmes. The Holmes Stereo Viewer was the most common type of stereoscope from 1881 until 1939. A stereoscope is composed of two pictures mounted next to each other. Each picture is taken from a slightly different viewpoint. When observing the pictures through a special viewer, the pair of two-dimensional pictures merge together into a single three-dimensional photograph. Stereoscopes continued to be widespread in America until the 1930s when stereoscope production declined, likely due to the new interest in motion pictures.

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