| The African-American Collection consists mainly of images from photography's earliest era, 1840-1890. While the bulk of the collection focuses on the middle class in the nineteenth century, rare 1840's daguerreotypes of slaves and other topical images make the Collection an important national resource. The only known daguerreotype of a ceremony for freeing slaves is perhaps the rarest item. | 
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| The collection also includes images of indigenous African cultures. The Burns Collection of African-American imagery fills a void in institutional collections. Noting that the traditional image of the African-American presented to the public represents the viewpoint of a third party - i.e. photographers taking photos of African-Americans to highlight social prejudice or, on the other extreme, as sentimental heroic representations - Dr. Burns concentrated his collection on the "routine" portrait: images depicting successful people as they wished themselves to be seen. | |
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