[1] As Edward Epstean was working on Hopkins & Blaut's new photoengraving department, he also started a personal library to better understand the reproductive processes of photography.
His library grew with the acquisitions of Stephen H. Horgan, William Gamble, Josef Maria Eder, and Gabriel Cromer.
In 1934, The Epstean Collection was incorporated in The Columbia University Library with the help of curator Hellmut Lehmann-Haupt.
[2] In 1932, Epstean started translating Josef Maria Eder's History of Photography and in 1935 it was published by Columbia University Press.
He also translated other important photohistorical studies from French and German by Victor Fouqué, Georges Potonnieé, and Erich Stenger.