365 Days of Art: March 4 – Halftone Engraving Used to Print Photographs in Newspaper

The first halftone image: a shantytown on Fifth Avenue in NYC, printed in the Daily Graphic.

March 4, 1880

Halftone engraving, used to print photographic images in shades of gray, was used for the first time when the Daily Graphic was published in New York City. An editorial ran at the same time, stating:

“This process has not yet been fully developed. We are still experimenting with it. We feel confident that our experiments will, in the long run, result in success and that pictures will eventually be regularly printed…”

Prior to this point, images were limited to black and white line drawings.