The ancient Greeks were the first to discover the laws of optics — in fact our word “camera” comes from the Latin Camera Obscura meaning “darkened room”, specifically one in which an image projected through a pinhole could be clearly seen on a screen (and traced on paper). Photography as we know it today began when Joseph Nicéphore Niépce, who projected camera obscura image to light-sensitive bitumen-coated metal plates, met fellow Frenchman, Louis Daguerre, who created the daguerreotype. There was one more, lesser known but no less im contributor, John Hershel.

On this day, September 9, in 1839, in a quiet experiment John Hershel made the first photograph on a glass plate. Daguerreotypes to that point were still on silver plates.

Hershel came about the discovery of photography independently, and gave a presentation of it to the Royal Society, but upon learning that Louis Daguerre published his findings (and coined the term “photography) already, he withdrew his correspondence. Still, in addition to the first glass plate photo, Hershel made the first cyanotope (blueprint) and, most strikingly, predicted the use of microfilm and its use in storing public records.