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History of the photo ID

"For a fast, easy and secure identification, Bests There is a" snapshot

On October 9, 1804, the governor of Massachusetts issued a passport to a man claiming to be Joseph Warren Revere, son of the famous patriot Paul Revere. The passport has no description, signature and certainly no picture of Joseph Revere.

Six months later, in England, the man is the same for another passport, providing documentation of his first passport and a letter of introduction from his father would. The charge d'affaires of the legation of the United States issued the passport on March 15, 1805. This time, the document signed by Joseph Revere, included a brief description of him.

If these passports were issued to the same man, the man who claims to be Joseph Warren Revere, son of Paul Revere? The governor of Massachusetts may have been able to vouch for the identity Revere, but can the same be said of the Charge d 'Affaires in London, and the consul in Rotterdam? Could the man described Chargé d 'Affairs as "fairly light" complexion, with a "common" front and "large" chin, be describes just three weeks later as having a "brown" complexion, with a "weak" front and "normal" chin?

In fact, the holder of the passport has been precisely who he said he was – Joseph Warren Revere, son of the famous patriot. But differences in the documents, their lack of positive identification and susceptibility to damage, forgery, tampering and misappropriation, highlight the challenges that continue to face the modern identification technology. Are we who we say we are? Can we prove it? Then the identification document to easily, quickly and cheaply? Is it functional and say to use? Is it durable and permanent?

The concern for positive identification is a relatively recent phenomenon. For most of recorded history it was hardly necessary for positive identification, because people rarely traveled beyond their own city or province. When they did, there was little interest in the achievement of identification documents because most people could not reed or write.

However, for the top foreign engaged in travel, the use of passports can be attributed to 450 BC According to the Bible (Nehemiah 2.7), the king of Persia issued passport Nehemiah, the governor had appointed to rule in Palestine: "If it please the king, let letters be given me governors of the province beyond the river they can let me pass through until I come to Judah. "

Prior to 1796, U.S. passports will contain descriptions of their bearers, probably because they were supposed to be "gentlemen" whose moral standards prevent misrepresentation and where an inspection of their physical characteristics would be considered an insult.

Times change and moral coded. At the end of the War of Independence, the Continental Congress created the Department of Foreign Affairs (which later became the Department of State) responsible, among other things, the granting of passports. In 1976, U.S. passports issued abroad were required to contain a physical description. In 1811, the same requirement has been extended to passports issued to Washington.

Local and state authorities issued passports until 1856, when Congress limited the function department Federal State. With the exception of periods of war, passports were not required for international travel until 1914: until then, they were only government to government requests for safe passage and assistance for their citizens.

Introduction to Photography
With the invention of photography by Louis Daguerre portrait practice in 1839, has become possible to create and set of photographs of real people. But even the greatest inventions take time to spread throughout society. photography is a complex process and skilled practitioners with little until 1888, when George Eastman introduced the Kodak camera housing 1. The aircraft was loaded with film and was referred to the treatment plant, printing and reloading. In the first two years cameras 1000.000 sold.

One of the first implementations of the photograph identification was a test of 1906 by the U.S. Department of War to add photos to personnel records.

It was not until 1915 that the photographs were required comports of U.S. passports. Until This time U.S. passports printed on one sheet of paper and contained essentially the same information as the design, ornamentation and use of seals. Six years later passports were printed on watermarked paper to guard against fraudulent alteration.

On the home front, to prevent spies, saboteurs and "fifth columnists" infiltrating the defense plants and other industries to support production in wartime, the government has ordered photograph employers and fingerprints of all workers with access to sensitive areas and issue them identification documents of photos that could be easily controlled by security personnel. For most employers, is the first time the safety of employees and identification has become an important issue in the workplace.

Unlike the identification effort of the armed forces, where a single department determined how the order would be satisfied, the implementation has been left in the hands of employers, subject to approval by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The College has proved somewhat difficult to achieve.

Some employers have acted independently. Others, such as the 157 companies in Racine, Wisconsin, have formed an association Manufactures which issued the document identification standard for all workers in Racine defense led to two popular solutions – the photo button and the photo card. Dozens of homes and commercial camera systems where developed for these purposes.

Photo buttons come in a variety of forms, generally 1 ½ – 2 inches in diameter and were constructed of two in diameter and were constructed of two pieces of copper. The back plate is solid metal, which was placed a cover photo and acetate. The brass plate was open in the middle to let the slide show through and bore the name and location the company raised around its perimeter before. The entire Assembly was inserted in the press that the hand folded around the rim plate the backplate. Any attempt to remove or lift the copper acetate was easily identifiable.

While companies may send their employees to local photographers to have their portraits, many sought a system that kept the photographic process under their own control, maximizing safety, reduce costs and keep their workers on the site.

Early ID Systems
Volume high ID device developed for the war effort was the identification Graflex Unit, developed by Folmer Graflex Corporation of Rochester, NY He had a goal and an 75mm prefocused interchangeable film magazine can accommodate up to 100 feet of 35mm film. A fully charged device may take up to 800 pictures without reloading.

The Graflex camera was attached to an adjustable platform can be raised or lowered to accommodate the subject, who was photographed standing before a table with his chest pressed up against the front of the platform. Facing the camera to the end of the platform has been an ID holder, under normal operating conditions the system could Photography 200 people per hour. One user reported that he had photographed the man as 480 people per hour.

Companies that have not have access to the Graflex camera or a similar unit, or could not afford such a system came with their own solutions. One of these companies was the Columbian Steel Tank Co. of Kansas City, Missouri.

In an article reproduced in several industry publications in 1942, advertising director RS Robinson describes in detail how Colombia had assembled a camera system similar in design and function of the system Graflex. Equipped with Kodak Brownie camera $ 6.35 Reflex, an awning backdrop, two lighting stands, lights and a wood chipper, the total cost of the system is $ 30. Each stop to reload after each 12 pictures, the system was able to photograph 60 to 75 employees per hour – and as a Murphy bed, fold the cons wall when not in use.

The Graflex, Colombian and other similar systems have taken the head and shoulder-portraits to create buttons and photo identity cards composite. For organizations that want a more secure identity card, cameras and systems have been developed that produce a single piece, all the photo cards.

Typical of these two camera system was built by Sam Kitrosser to produce identity cards for the Massachusetts Committee on Public Safety. Kitrosser built a box with portrait and lighting Ansco Memo paper and two single 35mm frame mounted near the top. A camera (loaded with a film portrait) facing the object and the other (responsible the film with high contrast prints), shot in a mirror that reflects down into the interior of the box. Placed on the merits was the technical specifications of the subject.

Each unit had masks the film plane, one to block all but the area of portrait and others to block Portrait of the data sheet to be photographed. By inserting the two negatives together, they could be printed at once to produce a map photo identification with all data and picture on one sheet of photographic paper. As a card in one piece, it was very difficult moving portraits without the attempt becoming evident.

In a four-month period in 1942, Kitrosser and his deputy, and four other teams equipped identification system, have traveled the Massachusetts production of 250,000 identification cards for police, fire, transit and others involved in civil defense and public security work.

The duo Monroe-camera
Although the system Kitrosser and others like it produced a piece of the photo card and a sandwich from negatives, a negative one piece would be safer. The October 1941 issue of Technique magazine photo shows a system, called Monroe Duo-camera, which may well be regarded as the first modern system of photo identification.

Developed by Spencer F. Monroe and marketed by the National Photo Identity Corp. of Chicago, the system in one step Monroe produced a negative piece and embodied all the basic functions of most advanced film-based today identification of central emission systems

The article explained that Monroe had the idea of the camera in 1937 when he tried to cash a check for $ 200 at a Miami hotel. When the cashier asked for identification, Monroe emptied the contents of his wallet on the counter. The cashier replied skeptical. "Sir, all these cards and things would have been picked up from someone on the street."

Monroe finally convinced the cashier of his identity by showing him a newspaper clipping containing his photograph.

The experience has led Monroe to develop a camera system that could simultaneously on a single photograph of a negative portrait, signature and fingerprint data written. Four years later, amid concern for national security, the Duo-Monroe Camera entry.

The aircraft was equipped Monroe lenses of fixed focal Wollensak two, three traffic lights portrait and two internal document. The ingenious set-up set of lenses on opposite sides film. The objective portrait photographed the object and the image projected on the front of the film while the objective projected document image Plug out of a mirror and on the back of the film. carefully masking prevented images as interfering with each other.

The camera Monroe instead of 200 feet of 35mm film and was said to be able to photograph a person in five seconds, about 250 people in one hour.

The unidentified author of the article in 1941 recognized the importance of photo identification to the war effort, but added that astute prediction system of photo identification Monroe: "… probably the real future of the device lies in its ability identify people by their image has allowed Mr. Monroe to get her check cashed. "

In fact, photo ID cards have changed little in appearance since the Second World War. Most, then as now, contains the holder's photo, personal information, a number identification, a logo of the organization, and the signing of an issuing agent. What has changed since the mid-40s are the methods production and security and functionality.

Id Specialized Development
The first mayor of post-war improvement of photo ID has been the introduction of the 1948 Model 95 Polaroid Land instant camera. offered first to public in a department store in Boston, the camera sepia photos developed in one minute. Most of demonstration images have been standing in front of customers a white wall and staring into the camera, as they would if the image was to be used for an identity card. Indeed, the standard consumer cameras Polaroid has been used for composite identity card.

The first attempt to turn the camera produces a standard identification more special was the introduction in 1952 of Fairchild Camera-Polaroid Id, producing for ID photos on a single sheet of Polaroid Flash movie. The Fairchild Model 95 aircraft used the rearview camera, instant film container transport and development of the system, and replaced Polaroid lens / shutter assembly with an assembly Wollensak, the stereo image splitter gear lever and.

With the objective shifted down, the dispatcher sent two stereo images side by side through the lens and projected onto the upper half of the film. Without advance The film of the meeting was moved to its upward position and a second exposure was made, exposing new images Towing on the lower half of the film.

The Fairchild camera system was sitting on a tripod equipped with towing lights right and portrait view left and a plate of name / ID holder for the camera. The subject was in front of a screen with white down his chest placed against the plate. The camera can create portraits of people with dual trailer per minute, and 10 minutes to allow reloading of the camera, picture 100 people in one hour.

In 1955, Polaroid has launched its own attachment lens beam-splitter, called stereo-Tech, which had not require changes to the standard model 95 camera and produced two portraits of identity on a single sheet of instant film.

Sat Kitrosser, who had developed a camera system in wartime ID, written for Polaroid after the war and then joined Itek Corp. In 1961, he developed Itek camera for Quad, a case of four lenses that have used the workhorse model 95 Polaroid instant camera film from its system. The Quad camera lenses used high quality and professional vision optics that makes good use of studio lighting, and cameras mounted on the lights. A cache system for the authorized purpose the operator to take all or part of the four photos at the same time.

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