Joseph L. Bates

American, ca. 1807-1886

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Joseph L. Bates was a dealer of fancy goods, umbrellas and musical instruments in Boston by the late 1830s. As Secretary of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association he oversaw their regular exhibitions in Faneuil Hall in the 1850s and 1860s. By the early 1870s, his fancy goods included sterescopes and stereo views whose mounts advertised Oliver Wendell Holmes' stereoscope "with the inventions and improvements added by" Bates.