An archive of materials related to a prominent Pennsylvania-Virginia family including a photographic opalotype portrait on 'milk glass' of a young Virginia socialite, Anna Louise Ferguson (later Mrs. William T. C. Rogers

An unframed 1860 debating team oval plaque is 12" x 14". It is titled "Addisonian Contestants March 8, 1860 / Allegheny City College" and filled with calligraphic scrollwork. Each of its four oval albumin photographs measure 2.5" x 3.5" of the Debater, Essayest (J. S. Ferguson), Delaimer, and Orator. The photographs have faded; there is a crease at the top, and it is lightly soiled and toned.

A circa 1900 opalotype (milk glass photograph) of a young Anna Louis Ferguson (daughter of J. S. Ferguson) roughly cut into a 2" x 3" oval that is attached to a metal hanger and has a neatly-cut protective glass cover. Its frame is missing. The opalotype is in nice shape with an accompanying note reads, "Mrs. Wm Rogers . . . who many years ago restored Belmont for a summer home."

20 scrapbook pages ranging from 1883 to 1914 and contain articles, clippings, and obituaries. 14 are about John Scott Ferguson. The six remaining pages contain obituaries and clippings about the death of his son, Edwin G. Ferguson, in 1903 at the age of 38 from complications resulting from rheumatic heart disease. The disbound pages have some minor soiling and edgewear.

Three engravings. A circa 1903 engraving of Edwin G. Ferguson is 8" x 11" and has some light soiling and edgewear. One circa 1914 engraving of John Scott Ferguson measures 7" x 10". A second measures 9.5" x 12.5". Both are in nice shape.

A black leatherette memorial book contains 51 pages of testaments to John Scott Ferguson by members of the Pennsylvania Bar.

Ferguson was one of the most prominent lawyers in Pennsylvania. Although residing primarily in Pittsburgh, he also used the somewhat worse-for-wear Belmont Plantation near Leesburg, Virginia as a summer home. His daughter, Anna Louise Rogers (nee Ferguson), did much to restore its elegance. Her daughter, Nancy Graham Rogers, graduated from Agnes Scott College and became a prominent virologist who helped develop a typhus vaccine during World War Two.

The Belmont mansion house was built in 1799 by Ludwell Lee, the son Richard Henry Lee, a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Today, it is the center of a golf course community. Belmont Country Club.

The opaltype process, invented in the 1850s, essentially used negatives to expose glass plates that had been sensitized with collodion and silver gelatin like sheets of photographic paper. The process resulted in images that were similar in appearance to ivory miniatures.

A nice collection with a relatively scarce opalotype photograph. A collection of papers related to Nancy Graham Rogers is maintained by the Thomas Balch Library in Leesburg, Virginia.