Charles Horatio Addison was born in Southhampton, England, in 1853. His parents lost their fortunes in a failed venture that promised to cure consumption with the extracts of beetle wings. They moved to the United States in 1866, settling in Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood. Charles, just 13, had become fascinated with the sciences - chemistry and biology in particular - and attended Our Lady of Sorrows School for Boys where he excelled. As a boy he worked as a grocery delivery boy and met many interesting people in the neighborhood. Among those was a chemist, Dr. Merz, who took the curious boy in his lab and showed him the workings of the earliest photographic processes - Daguerreotypes and salted papers. Before long, Charles was Dr. Merz’ assistant in the lab, preparing solutions and coating plates.

After receiving his degree in 1878, Dr. Charles Addison continued his scientific research in many areas, though primarily zoology. As there were infestations of rats in his neighborhood, Addison was never lacking for subjects. However he was lacking for funds, as the knowledge of rodent ailments proved unprofitable. So Addison began to make photographic portraits for paying customers. He was able to afford to rent a office and studio above the Schneberger Grocery store where he had worked at the corner of 18th Street and Fisk (now Carpenter).

Addison made portaits of people from many different walks of life, including some of the powerful businessmen and their families who were making fortunes in the booming industrial city of Chicago. One family in particular that Addison came to know were the Crosswells.

It is not clear exactly how Dr. Addison came to know the Crosswell family. It is likely that Arthur Crosswell simply paid a call to Addison’s Pilsen studio. However a “Ch. Adeson” (sic) appears as an unpaid account from one of the brothels that Arthur allegedly ran, dating several months prior to the first portraits Addison made of the Crosswells. Addison was known as a serious man, devoted to his work and not particularly gregarious. He never married, and there are no accounts of any female relations, but he was known to come and go at very late hours and one family member disclosed that a box containing ladies’ stockings was found in his apartment after his disappearance. Addison’s studio was later sold to become a dentist’s office.

Charles Addison’s diary in which he kept notes about his experiments with the Crosswell Twins was also discovered in his studio and can be read here.