Prominent Payson Photographer's Work Lives On in Albums and Exhibitions

You’ll find “O. A. Daniels, Photographer” stamped on numerous photographs depicting Payson and the city’s early residents, including this unidentified portrait.  A prominent photographer, Orson A. Daniels was born in Payson, Utah, in 1865, and had at one time printed a small newspaper and made tintype photographs with his brother, Thomas Daniels.

Summarizing an account shared by his daughter, Stena C. Daniels, People Preserving Peteetneet Board Member Verdene Page-Wilson, in the 1990s, wrote that Orson’s first photo gallery “in Payson was on the west side of Main Street next to a meat market owned by Philo Wightman.  He later built a more modern gallery on First South near Main Street. Not being able to make a very good living in Payson, he traveled at first in a covered wagon that served as his photo lab. He would set up his tent and photograph people in mining towns and surrounding areas. Years later, family members took him around in an old truck.”

Mr Daniels died in his hometown, Payson, in 1955.  His work lives on in photo albums and displays. A permanent exhibition space in Payson bears his name today: the Daniels Photo Exhibit Room at the Peteetneet Museum and Cultural Arts Center.