Who Were They?

Here we have another of the very small CDVs. I acquired two of these as a bonus in a lot I purchased off eBay. They are fascinating to me because they are so small, yet the photo quality is on par with a standard sized CDV. I don’t know how common these were – I have been collecting photos for about 10 years and this is the first I have seen a CDV this small. What a stroke of luck to get two in one lot! The camera wouldn’t have been any smaller, so this print size was a specific choice – I imagine it similar to the tiny “mug shot” sized photos we used to get with school photo packages.

This image shows three young men. They appear to be leaning into one another so they would be fully in the image. Two are looking to the left of center and one is looking directly into the camera lens. Was that an artistic choice by the photographer, do you think?

This image was made by Lothrop and Cunningham in Providence, RI. Note the handwriting on the top edge puts this in the year 1891. I can’t quite make out what word is written there, however. Mystic? That is a town near Providence, so I suppose it’s possible. Do you have any ideas what that word is?