Who Were They?

Lost and forgotten photos from the past

Sisters

Mrs Marvel

2 comments

April 5, 2011

I could swear that this girl is the same girl as one of these girls. It is possible this is the earlier photo and the older girl in this picture is the oldest of the three in the second photo. The girls just have such a similarity of features, I can’t discount the possibility they are the same girls.

We add another locale to our puzzle to further confound Iggy: St John’s Michigan. The photographer was Plunkett. By the deckeled edges of the card we know this is about 1895, but Plunkett may have been in business in the 1880s as well.

Only a few more photos left in the Dobb Long Book. Stay tuned for the last few clues to who this family might have been!

It’s me!

Mrs Marvel

4 comments

April 4, 2011

I always think this woman and I bear some resemblance, although it could just be the soft round face and double chin, lol. I think she is the mother of our “all boy” child previously shown. She has obviously curly hair that was difficult to tame, glasses and small earrings. She even has a strand of pearls that sit very close to her neck – that would bother me. From what I can see of her dress, this is an 1890s photograph.

The photography studio was Hardy & Van Arnam of Troy NY. They appear on the list of most prolific photographers during the CdV era. In their little town, one of their competitors was Zeph. F. Magill, who we saw previously and who was involved in some sort of scandal involving a fraud suspect. It appears that they might have won the competition being as Magill does not appear on that list of prolific photographers. They opened their studio in the early 1870s.

All boy

Mrs Marvel

7 comments

April 3, 2011

Sometimes when you look at one of these old photos that show a child dressed in the ambiguous fashions of the Victorian era, you can just tell the child is a boy or a girl. That is the case here. This child is all boy to me. The dress is cute, but for the era it is surprisingly not adorned with much trimming, further leading me to think “boy.” It looks like a checked fabric of some type, perhaps a lightweight wool, with darker velvet cuffs and neckerchief and many buttons on the blouse. The sleeves look a little short for him, so perhaps he is taller than his sibling or cousin who may have had the dress originally. The skirt is pleated and you can easily tell there is a petticoat of some kind underneath to keep it fanned out so nicely. He has dark stockings and black shoes. Once again a photographer posed a child standing on a chair. Were people just more trusting back then? There is no way I’d let my child stand on a chair for as long as needed for one of these vintage photographs!

The photographer was Walter in Manchester….England? New Hampshire?

UPDATE: Iggy’s got a good memory and pointed out that we have seen this photographer previously, and he is located in Manchester, Iowa. Thanks Iggy!

Rather Continental, old chap!

Mrs Marvel

2 comments

April 2, 2011

This is another of my favorite photos from the Dobb Long Book because it exemplifies that snooty impression that so many men tried to exude (and yet failed at miserably). This fellow has the Oriental smoking cap, mustache/whiskers, and tweedy suit with a dotted tie. Interesting, he has some sort of jewelry on the base of the tie knot, and it looks very much like it has a woman’s face on it. I bet he wanted people to think he was someone important, but at heart he was a sweetie pie. I can just hear him saying “Rather Continental, old chap!” to a friend while they talk about hunting dogs and smoke cigars, all the while he privately wonders what his wife has gotten up to.

The photographer here was A. S. Holmes of Troy and Albany, NY.

Over the stile you go

Mrs Marvel

4 comments

April 1, 2011

My mother used to read me the story of The Old Woman and Her Pig, an English fairy tale in which a woman buys a pig at the market, but can’t get it over the stile in the fence. I can clearly remember asking what a stile was and the wonderful interplay between me and my mother as we discussed stiles and what they were used for. For the record, a stile is an opening or place to get over a fence, but not a gate. This fellow is in one of those “tranquil outdoor settings” that were so popular with photographers in the later Victorian era. I love his bowler hat (which I see as dove gray), his mustache, his foot up on one step of the stile, the whole thing. This is one of my favorite photos from the Dobb Long Book.

The photographer was Arnout of Troy, NY.

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