George Barker (photographer)

In July 1862, he made his first trip to Niagara Falls, New York, where he found a job working for Platt D. Babbitt.[4][5] By the late 1860s, he had studios in both London and Niagara Falls, with the Niagara studio called Barker's Stereoscopic View Manufactory and Photograph Rooms,[6][7] and had become known nationwide for his large-format (up to 18 in × 20 in (46 cm × 51 cm)) and stereographic prints of the falls.[8] In 1866, he won a gold medal for landscape photography at the convention for the Photographers Association of America, held in Saint Louis.[4]

Barker's Niagara studio was destroyed by fire on February 7, 1870,[9] but his negatives survived.[5]

Barker was one of the earliest photographers to visit the state of Florida. At the time, photography in Florida was challenging, as much of the state remained undeveloped, which meant photographers needed to carry their bulky equipment through the state's wetlands and subtropical jungles, as well as deal with delicate film in hot and humid conditions. Barker spent nearly four years (on and off), from 1886 to 1890, documenting much of northern and central Florida.[10]

In addition to his well-known landscape photographs, Barker traveled the United States, documenting natural disasters such as the Louisville Tornado of 1890[11] and the 1889 Johnstown flood.[12]