A Workshop with Maureen Taylor, The Photo Detective

Meet Maureen Taylor

"Nation's foremost historical photo detective" - Wall Street Journal

In 1978, Maureen Taylor fell in love at first sight–with a shiny metal photograph known as a daguerreotype.  The people looked real and touchable as if they could step out of the frame into the present. In a moment, all the history she’d studied and the families she researched came together. She knew this was not infatuation, but the real thing.

She’s never looked back. As a photo curator, genealogist, and now as a writer and photo identification/preservation expert, the focus of Maureen’s work remains family photography, history and genealogy. Through PhotoDetective.com, she’s dedicated to helping those who share her infatuation with discovering the stories behind images of the past.

Maureen Taylor is an internationally recognized expert on the intersection of history, genealogy, and photography. She has been featured in top media outlets, including The View, Better Homes & Gardens, the Boston Globe, Martha Stewart Living, MSNBC, New Morning (Hallmark Channel), Life Magazine, DIY: Scrapbooking, PBS Ancestors, Claritin’s Moment of Clarity, Creative Memories’ Lasting Moments, Dear Myrtle, and Satisfaction Magazine. Maureen is the author of a number of books and magazine articles, as well as a contributing editor at Family Tree Magazine.

First as a photo curator and editor, and now as a freelance writer and consultant, Maureen Taylor’s work primarily focuses on photographs. She helps people solve a range of photo-related mysteries, from dating a Civil War-era daguerreotype to organizing gigabytes of family photos from a digital camera.

Maureen investigates photographs the way private eyes investigate cases. She discovers stories behind family pictures by following clues … a hat, the shape of a woman’s sleeve, or a sign in the background. Through her website, PhotoDetective.com, Maureen offers practical, affordable advice on how to save and organize photos. She also writes about the latest photo-related topics, products, and media coverage on her Photo Detective blog.

Books Authored by Maureen A. Taylor include:

Finding the Civil War in Your Family Album
Civil War images, whether it’s a man in uniform or a woman posing with her children, tell the story of your family’s involvement in a critical period of history. If you’re not sure if your photo dates from that timeframe, this book will help you determine when it was taken.

Fashionable Folks Hairstyles 1840-1900
Using the clues explained in this book, you can learn a surprising amount about your ancestors by studying their buns, braids and beards. This book is particularly useful to genealogists, social and personal historians, costume designers and hairstylists.

The Last Muster: Images of the Revolutionary War Generation
A remarkable work of documentary history, The Last Muster is a collection of rare nineteenth-century photographic images—primarily daguerreotypes, ambrotypes, and carte des visite paper photographs—of the Revolutionary War generation.

Preserving Your Family Photographs
This book provides all the information you need to care for your family photograph collection. She outlines in straightforward steps how to add value to your home collection by using the methods that conservators and photo curators use every day!