Post Mortem Photography

During the Victorian Era when daguerreotype photographs became popular and a cheaper option to the painted portrait post mortem photography became popular.  I'm sure that most of you have seen the portraits taken of the someone's loved one after they had passed away either in a coffin or laying down.  But prior to researching this I did not realize that they took photographs of the dead that made them actually appear to be alive.  As you can see in the following photo they actually held the person up with a pole.

This photo came from an article related to this practice in the Huffington Post.  You can view the article along with other photos they have posted with it here.

This practice was especially used to create images of dead children.  This was a period of high infant mortality.  So high was the demand for post- mortem photographs that many photographers were able to make a living from them alone. (Cadwallader, 16).  Sometimes these photos were the only one that was ever taken of the individual.  Families were proud of these photos and would even display them in their homes.