We are often surprised at the number of collectors who fail to understand that Wallace Nutting pictures from certain states are rarer than those from other states.
Therefore, let us try to put this in a little better perspective for you.
According to the Nutting's Biography, Nutting began his first photographic work in New England during the summer of 1897, while he was a Congregational Minister in Providence, RI.
Over the next few years Nutting took pictures in all 6 New England states.
By 1905, he had resigned from the Ministry and opened his first Photography Studio in Southbury, Conn.
, where his picture business greatly expanded.
As his business continued to grow over the next 7 years, Nutting continued to confine his work primarily to New England.
After moving to Framingham MA in 1912, his business had greatly expanded.
Looking for new sources for pictures, Nutting turned primarily to expanding the variety of Interior scenes in his inventory of pictures.
Purchasing his Chain of Old Colonial Homes, Nutting continued to photograph primarily New England subjects.
However, as his business continued to increase into the 1920's, he felt an increasing demand for new pictures...
from areas outside of New England.
And after he hired a staff to assume many of his day-to-day duties, Nutting began to travel more in order to photograph scenes beyond the borders of New England.
Probably the best record of Wallace Nutting's travels outside of New England would correspond with the publication dates of his States Beautiful book series.
His first five books were all from New England states o Vermont Beautiful (1922) o Massachusetts Beautiful (1923) o Connecticut Beautiful (1923) o New Hampshire Beautiful (1923) o Maine Beautiful (1924).
What this would seem to suggest is that Wallace Nutting was able to chum out five books within a two-year period...
by using pictures he had taken over the past 25 years.
With his New England series out of the way, Nutting was able to begin traveling more extensively to newer, yet-untapped areas.
For example, Pennsylvania Beautiful, published in 1924, was probably photographed in 1922-23.
England & Ireland Beautiful, published in 1925 and 1928 respectively, were photographed primarily during his 3rd and final trip abroad early in 1925 (combined with some of his earlier photographs taken during his 1904 and 1915 European trips).
New York Beautiful (1927) and Virginia Beautiful (1930) were also photographed significantly later than the New England states.
So, using 1941 (the year of Nutting's death) as the final year of picture sales (although a very limited number were sold by Esther Svenson after Nutting's death), pictures from New England were sold over a 40 year period, while pictures from New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia were sold over only a 10-20 year period.
Hence, significantly fewer pictures were sold in these later states.
Factor in the extremely low sales during the depression years, the degree of rarity becomes even greater.
As a general rule of thumb, pictures from New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia will usually be rarer than pictures from the New England States.
However, there are always exceptions to general rules of thumb.
For example, The Natural Bridge, a Virginia picture, was very popular and sold many thousands of copies.
Other less popular New England pictures sold relatively few copies, and are therefore rarer today.
However, as a general rule, keep in mind that pictures from the "later" states will usually be rarer than those from the earlier New England states.