Peter Jason wrote:
When altering an image with Photoshop, that images
original properties seem altered and take on the
date of the Photoshop session. How can one
maintain the date of taking in properties?

To maintain the file system level dates, you'd
"Save As" and change the name. Some photo editors
might want you to use an "Export" function rather
than a "Save As", depending on their own weird
ideas about what save means.

sunflowers.jpg July25,2018

sunflowers_1.jpg Aug17, 2018

By keeping the same root name, you have some idea
how the edited version refers to an "original" photo.

petunias.jpg
petunias_1.jpg

sunflowers.jpg
sunflowers_1.jpg

The EXIF data on the original photo, preserves
what the camera put there. Depending on how
you've handled your artwork, and what happens
with various tools you might use, the EXIF data
might get "beat up" a bit after a bunch of edits
of the _1, _2, etc intermediate JPG files.

Windows even has a push button option to delete
metadata, which gives another way to lose the EXIF
data given half a chance.

The beauty of computers, is you can lose just
about anything when it comes to files. And generally
the more effort you put into polishing stuff, the
more joy the computer/OS takes in breaking your
efforts. I've run into a few people who have
spent hundreds of hours on their Media Center
collection, adding artwork and descriptions,
only to have that work "trashed". You can't
trust a computer further than you can throw it
in the back garden.

Paul