Lost Photographs of History – James Madison and Thomas Jefferson
4th U.S. president and the shortest, James Madison stands beside the “Sage of Monticello,” 3rd U.S. president Thomas Jefferson all decked out in top hats. Had photography existed at that time; perhaps this is how a photo of Madison and Jefferson might have looked.
The photo is a Photoshop composition using the faces of Madison and Jefferson taken from their life masks. The life masks were cast from plaster molds of their heads in 1825 by J. I. Browere.
Inspired by “Thomas Jefferson And His Family Paper Dolls in Full Color” by Tom Tierney, I wanted to see what Jefferson and Madison looked like with top hats.
Shadows were added to their faces to give the impression of a real top hats placed upon their heads. Jefferson’s eyes were changed slightly to give the appearance of looking directly into the camera.
The close-up view reveals a slight blur. I added blur since the suit Jefferson is wearing was blurred in the original image. The photo was also sepia-toned to look aged.
Follow Digital Yarbs on Twitter
Follow @DigitalYarbs
Subscribe to the Digital Yarbs Youtube Channel
What started as a fictional graphic novel has led me to an in-depth study and curiosity to know everything about him, including what he looked like. Anyway, doing all this research on Madison and making at least two trips to Montpelier, I feel as if I’ve gotten to know the little fellow and Dolley too!
It’s been fun.
Copyright & Disclaimer:
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Transformed Images on this site as a whole that I have created are free to anyone for NonCommercial use with attribution under the license above. Images on this site that are used by permission, logos and images of me do not fall under this license. While most of my image elements are public domain, my own, from free stock sites or from purchased stock sites , some elements may be from copyrighted sources and are in my best judgment, “transformative fair use” for use on this site. If you use a transformed image I created, keep in mind that some images may have elements from purchased stock sites or copyrighted elements within the transformed images. These elements may or may not be transferable for your use. To understand transformative fair use, please see the Creative Law Center’s post about copyright and fair use: Is it Fair Use? Using the Creative Work of Others
