Big Announcement

Want to own an image from The New Found Photography?  Well folks, here is your chance.  A few selected photos can be purchased through Fine Art America.  No, not the original photo, but one of those  newfangled digital whatchamacallits.  My mark up is pretty small, so don't blame me for the prices.  Go to the-new-found-photography.fineartamerica.com to see what's for sale.  Too, I'm always willing to make copies of just about anything, so leave a comment and email if there are any requests.  Hey, I'm pushing 60 and trying to stay out of the poor house.  If only they still had those!

A Beach Front Hotel, The Travelers Collection

I'm starting with the mystery locations early with this group.  I went to Google images and entered "historic beach hotels" and found a couple of maybes, but no true match.  If anyone out there recognizes the building leave a comment.  There's one thing for sure, those palm trees eliminate Bar Harbor, Maine.

Click on travelers collection in the labels section for the other images in the lot.

Aloha, A New Travelers Collection

There it was, sitting on EBay with no one willing to bid.  Hey, it was cheap, so why the hell not.  This latest collection is photos from a person or family that liked to travel.  Some of the images have people, some don't.  A few are labeled, most not.  A handful are of places I recognize, but many of them will be posted as mystery locales, with the hope  that someone out there in blog land can set me straight.

Even though I've never been to Hawaii, this one was easy.  I've seen pictures and movies of Aloha Tower and Honolulu Harbor before.  But where are all the hotels?  The tower opened in 1926, and the building boom didn't start until the late fifties to early sixties.  So, somewhere in a 30 to 35 year window.

Like most of my other collections, this one will be spread out over a few months.  Look for travelers collection in the labels section at the bottom of the post.

Young Louise Koss

This is a very tiny photograph, right around an inch and a half on the long side.  It must have required a deft hand from the colorist to work on an image that small.

Written on the back, "Louise Koss"  There's a big problem with trying to track down info on young girls.  It's almost certain that Louise Koss married at some point in her life, and took her husband's last name.  Just for the hell of it, I tried doing a search on Louise and did find more than a few women with that name.  But none the right age and with a different, married name.

A Stylish Lady

From the thirties, I think.  No info on the print.

The Army Hospital Album 6

So, who are the doctors and who are the patients?  I think the doctors wear shoes and the patients wear slippers.

 On collections this big, I like to break things up a bit, so for awhile, I'll be moving on to other photos.  Click on army hospital collection in the labels section at the bottom of the post to see the whole lot.  I'll pick this lot up again in the next three or four weeks.

The Army Hospital Album 5

I do like some of the photos in this post, especially the first and third in the column.

So who were the soldiers in Ward D-10?  Just run of the mill guys, with run of the mill medical problems?  Or are these photos a record of men with special problems?  In looking through the album, I don't see anyone with wounds.  It makes me wonder if the guys in Ward D-10 were dealing with emotional problems.  But then again, maybe they all had something simple, like the flu.

Click on army hospital collection in labels at the bottom of the post to bring up the lot.

The Army Hospital Album 4

Go back to the first post from this collection to see how the album was put together.  It's made up of a number of cellophane sleeves which hold photos.  Almost all of the photos have been cut to fit, with two pictures per sleeve.  The third photo is one of a handful of images not cut down to a smaller size, and the format that the album was made for.  It's a 3 1/2x5,  basic 35mm.

Sadly the military doesn't build for the ages.  It's clear that the building in that photo wasn't made to last.  It's also so generic that it's impossible to hunt down a locale by comparing it with photos from known bases.  Are the guys in overalls doctors or patients?

Click on army hospital collection in the labels section to bring up the whole collection.

The Army Hospital Album 3

It looks like they're having a party at the army hospital.  Though not, I suspect, in Hawaii.  Click on army hospital collection in the labels section at the bottom of the post to bring up the lot.

The Fountain of Love

Is that water bottled?  Written on the back, "How are your dances prospering?  Rec'd yours O. 12.  Your remedy is pretty good but I should wait to practice  it oftener.  Tell that kid brother of yours to wake up.  Vivian"  Mailed to "Mr. Earle Wilbur, Headwater, Maine"  There is a postmark, but it's very faded.  I think it's from Madison, Maine...well, that's just my best guess.  I have checked an atlas, and no Headwater, Maine is listed.  Small towns do disappear, but it's more likely that it was absorbed into a larger community.

And of, course, clicking on flirtation in the labels section will bring up the whole collection.

Waltz Home, Sweet Home

Another from the flirtation collection. Another from the illustrated song series.  Another from the camera of De Witt C. Wheeler.  No message, never mailed.

Kiss Me

I'm going to stick with the flirtation collection for a bit.  This one is another from publisher Theodor Eismann, with a photo from De Witt C. Wheeler.  I've put up a couple of others from Wheeler.  He was a photographer who had a brief success making magic lantern slides for home and theater use.  Some of his slides can be found in the collection of Eastman House in Rochester, New York.  The collection is on line.

The message, "Aint that a sight. Right in broad daylight."  The card isn't signed, but we do know the writer was a bit of a poet.  The card was never mailed, but it does have an address.  "Nellie B. Stilson. Guilford, Me.  RFD"  I hope it got into her hands.

Click on flirtation in the labels section to bring up the lot.

A Ticklish Question

It's time to return to another one of the collections.  To recap, I bought an envelope of fifty postcards, all with a certain romantic flair.  The seller called them the flirtation cards, so hit flirtation in the labels section at the bottom of the post to bring up the lot.  Too, while most of the cards are either pure photograph or based on hand colored photos, some are pure illustration.  Those can be found on my other blog, www.fairuse-wjy.blogspot.com with the same label.

Written on the back, "Poll the front of this card is right it is a question are you coming down you had better believe me Fred"  Talk about run on sentences.  Despite the message, this card was never mailed.

Published by Theodor Eismann of Saxony and New York City.  In business from 1908 to 1914.

The Gothic Horror Hair Bow

I don't know about anyone else, but I associate that hair bow with twelve year old girls, not adult women.  That alone makes this image kind of odd, throw in the leafless trees and shadows, and it all seems rather creepy.  I don't know why, but it reminds me of Nosferatu.  The silent version directed by F.W. Murnau, not the surprisingly good Werner Herzog remake.

Stamped on the back, "H. POGADE, NEUKOLLN 50"  Neukollon, with two dots above the "O" is a neighborhood in Berlin.  It took a bit of web surfing, but I was able to find a reference to a Pogade Camera Store, in Berlin,  that dates back to, at least, the mid thirties.  There's a watermark on the back, "Agfa Lupex" that wasn't used before the mid forties, so 50 might be a year.

The Amazing All America Mid Century Modern Suburban Dream/Nightmare

We are a perverse people.  For thousands of years, people wanted a life of material comfort.  And then, here in the United States, we got that life.  From the early fifties through the late sixties it was suburban homes, cars with tail fins, televisions, refrigerators, good schools, a university education for the kids.  And we were discontent.  At least it gave John Cheever something to write about.  Dated "SEPT 60"

Glamour Couple

Looking very Hollywood.

Kathleen Madden

This is the third post in a row that I've put up that has featured a woman wearing fur.  A coincidence I assure you.  The strange looking background is where the photographic emulsion is peeling off the paper.  The lady's name is written on the back of the print.

Vamping In Fur

Yesterday's post featured a young girl in her mother's fur coat (maybe).  Today, it's the son.  Actually, this photo comes from a different source, so it's someone else's son.

Wealth and Status

When I was growing up, having a fur coat was quite the status symbol for women.  I'm not very good at guessing the age of kids, but my thought is that this girl is probably around fourteen or fifteen.  Is it her coat?  Could be.  If there's money in the family budget for a fur for mom, there might also be enough for the daughter as well.  A more likely explanation, her mother owned the fur and the daughter is dreaming about being ten or fifteen years older and having her own fur coat.  The presumed perks of adulthood.

In recent years, fur has become somewhat problematic for the fashion conscious woman.  Fur may still be stylish for women of a certain economic class.  Enough of them are sold that they can still be seen on the streets of the tonier enclaves.  But, wearing that fur may get anything from rude remarks to a splash of red paint.

And if anyone is wondering.  All the white spots on the photo is where the printer didn't clean the negative.  If a hair or bit of dirt is on the neg, it prints white, and someone has to get in there with a paintbrush and some spot tone.  I was tempted to get my spotting kit out and fill in all those white bits, but in the end, I was more interested in keeping things they way they were found.

The History They Witnessed

I have no idea where and when this picture was taken.  I do think it has a post World War 2, European feel to it.  Let's say, for the hell of it, it was taken the year I was born, 1955.  If the family matriarch was eighty, then she was born in 1875.  That means she lived through two world wars, that between them killed over 100 million people, and a flu pandemic that killed a similar number.   She was old enough to remember seeing the first cars, early airplane flights, advances in medicine, such as vaccines, x-rays, and penicillin.  The rise of communism and fascism.  She was born in a world where women weren't allowed to vote.  A world where most of the people in Africa, and many in Asia were ruled by a handful of European, colonial powers.  She saw nuclear weapons, jet aircraft and submarines.  The end of sail, and the rise of the great ocean liners.  When she was born, people lit their homes with candles or kerosene, and lived to see electric lights, movies, phonographs, radios, refrigerators, and television.  It's quite possible that the young boy on her left is still alive.  If so, he's lived to see trips to the moon, the fall of the Soviet Union, computers, and cell phones.

Not too long ago, I was asked by a twenty something if I had been overwhelmed by things like cell phones and computers?  Had I been awed by social media, knowing I could connect with anyone in the world?  No, things change, and you take it in stride.

The Biltmore Hotel and Pershing Square

I dug this old postcard out of the files after reading a story in Sunday's Los Angeles Times about Pershing Square, the bit of green in the foreground.  Yet again, L.A. is thinking about renovating Pershing Square.  Once upon a time, many years ago, Pershing Sq., was the Los Angeles version of Central Park.  I suppose, that's not the greatest of comparisons.  Our square is a city block, far smaller than New York's actual Central Park, but back then, Los Angeles was a far smaller city than it is now.  Then, Pershing Square was our little urban oasis, with "tall trees, gracious paths, and a burbling fountain at it's heart."  Or so it's described in the article.

But once again, change is the only constant.  In the fifties, those trees and paths were removed to make way for a 2000 car parking garage and the city bomb shelter. (How adorable that we thought  massive nuclear war survivable.)  Since then it's gone through more than a few renovations, the latest designed to make the park unattractive to the homeless.  I'm not even going to get into the whole issue of doing something about homelessness, but it should have occurred to the urban planner who thought that one up, that if the homeless wouldn't want to go there, neither would anyone else.

Anyway, we've got a new urban task force working on a long term plan for the park.  We've also got a couple of historians, husband and wife, Richard Schave and Kim Cooper, who are pushing an idea of their own.  Just make it like it was before the renovations, before the parking garage.  Anyone wishing to sign their on line petition, can go to Google and type in Pershing Square petition Schave and Cooper.  I just did.  There's even a postcard of what Pershing Square once looked like and a box for comments.

The caption for this postcard, "THE BILTMORE HOTEL, LOS ANGELES 13, CALIFORNIA."  and  "The largest hotel in western America.  1500 Rooms.  Situated between two tropical parks in heart of business district. Home of the Biltmore Bowl, a world-famous supper club.  Underneath the lawn in the foreground is Pershing square garage with a capacity for 2000 cars."  The message, "Hi!, Honestly we need you to make this party complete.  I've never been in such a fabulous place in my life. (aside from Bermuda!) Do so wish you were here.  Jenni"  Mailed to, "Miss Paula Galbraith, 505 Dunedin, Columbus, Ohio"  Postmark, "LOS ANGELES, DEC 30 11 AM 1954, CALIF."

Is the bomb shelter still there?  I couldn't find any info on that.

Washington, D.C.

In honor of our closed government.  No date or other information, but I'm guessing the forties.

Raise The Jolly Roger!

I wish my computer would stop with the auto correct!  Let's hear it for my beloved Pittsburgh Pirates.  After twenty straight years of loosing, not only did the Buccos finish above 500, they made the play-offs.  We beat Cincy in the play in game and got the wild card slot, and now we're one and one against the St. Louis Cardinals.  Let's go Bucs!

The Pittsburgh Pirates started off in 1882, in the American Association, but joined the older National League in 1887.  The Pirates won the World Series in 1909, 1925, 1960, 1971, 1979 and 2013.  There it is, my prediction.  This particular logo was used from 1966 to 1987.

Woman Attacked By Killer Lamp!

I stand by my interpretation.  Dated "12/11/60" but look at the plug.  It's European so the date is probably November 12, 1960.