JEFF ROSENHEIM: You know the ambrotype is the logical next development of photography after the daguerreotype. Instead of an image being made on a sheet of copper, which is opaque, it’s made on a sheet of glass, which of course is transparent.

NARRATOR: Look for the ambrotype of a woman beside a washtub: it’s toward the middle of the case. It’s an unusual image because it shows a woman engaged in everyday domestic labor.

ROSENHEIM: We don’t know if she's a housekeeper working for a family, or if she is the owner of the home. We just don’t know that. We can make some guesses.

NARRATOR: Writer Lucy Sante believes this woman must be the mistress of the house.

LUCY SANTE: She’s not a servant, she’s not beaten down, she’s not skinny. And she’s got one hand on the tub and one hand on her hip. She’s fully taking possession of the scene and of her belongings.

ROSENHEIM: Above her right shoulder, on our left, is the saw that she would use to cut branches to heat up the water for her to do laundry.

NARRATOR: She’s surrounded by tools: the objects she used in her work. In that sense, we might think of this photograph as one of the countless occupational portraits made during the 1800s.

SANTE: And you will see the locksmith next to his locks, for example, or the gunsmith next to his guns. And this being a domestic occupation, is still an occupation. So, this is, you know, this can count as a kind of feminist image.

NARRATOR: And here’s something else that makes this photograph special.

ROSENHEIM: Most ambrotypes and daguerreotypes were made inside studios.

SANTE: You’re being shown how this is not a photographer's backdrop. This is a real place.

ROSENHEIM: We have a glimpse of life outside the studio, and that itself was pretty rare before 1870.