If, as some have said, the Vietnam War was the first war to be seen on television, then the Civil War was the first American war that citizens on the home front could experience in photographs.

Barely more than a toddler, the young Robert Shimmin used to stand on a stool in a darkroom to watch the magic his father performed with light, lenses, film, and chemicals.

The rat-a-tat-tat of the snare drum, accompanied by the thundering beat of the bass drum, was all Kalamazoo’s Orcutt Post veterans of the Civil War needed when marching in local parades or rousing the men’s spirits at events and annual reunions.