1910s and 1920s Family Photos Restored To Life
As we continue to clean out the family homestead, we keep coming across more and more relics of the distant past.
We have found boxes of old, large scale photographic negatives, some from the turn of the century. A modern negative scanner has been able to restore some of these images to life. I'm grateful that my ancestors were such avid photographers.
It's taken some time to get these scanned in and work out who some of these people are. I wanted to share some of them here - not because I expect Steemit to have an interest in my personal family history, necessarily, but because the fashions, objects, and landscapes in these images may have some historical interest on their own.
This street-scape is interesting for the mix of horses and automobiles. It seems like the car on the left has it's hood open.
This is my great-grandfather Bert pushing my grandmother Bunny in a sled. This dates the picture around 1920.
My grandmother appears in this picture as well, bottom right. Her grandmother is directly above her, and her mother is to her left, holding her brother Walker. I love how well-dressed they all are for a picnic.
My grandmother and her brother again. (Sadly, Walker had a short and tragic life.)
Now, here's my great grandfather in his younger days. Probably closer to 1910.
And his future bride having a good time at the lake!
Grandma and her brother again. Haying time at the farm.
We think this is my great-great grandfather and his pit bull. They appear in a few different photos together. He was really going for the Mark Twain look.
A pretty sweet car. Put chains on the tires and it'll get through anything!
No idea who these guys are, but it looks like they're having a good time on the water. (And look at how much clothing they wear for boating. No skin-cancer for these guys.)
We've also found a box of letters from the civil war, between a surgeon serving on the front lines and his bride back home in Vermont. I believe they are from the ancestors of the great-great grandparents you see in the photos. At some point I want to scan in the originals and then try to type out the text and put them into chronological order - they're full of all kinds of great details about blood-fever and amputations. (But man, that 19th century handwriting is hard to read.)
What do you think - would Steemit have an interest in this sort of archival project?
And do you have any relics from your distant past?
Fascinating to see these old photos.
I have recently found two boxes of old family photos. Unfortunately as ever many of them don't have names or dates. And most of the people who might be able to identify them have now passed away.
I have started a little series on steemit called 'The Story of Me - and everyone I know' with these old photos. Still wondering if I should continue it or not.
I'll look up your series - it sounds interesting!
It's a shame we often don't get the opportunity to talk to people about this stuff before it's too late. My grandmother wasn't interested in telling us anything about all the history she had locked away in the attic. There was only one rule when we came to visit: "Don't touch my stuff!"
Well, I've got it now and I'm going to share it - at least the more interesting bits!
Thanks for reading.
In answer to your questions, yes and yes. I hope genealogical and other related archival work can have a place here in steemit.
I have items from my family and have collected photos and tintypes over the year. I just couldn't bear to see them thrown away.
I've returned a few to descendants of people in the pictures and various kinds of papers and certificates through connections on rootsweb and facebook.
There's lots of great genealogy resources out there these days, aren't there? That's really impressive that you were able to get these resources back to their descendants. What an exciting surprise for them!
I'm very grateful that I have a friend who works for the Mayflower Society here in New England who traced my family back six generations. It's been a great help in placing lots of these folks.
I've got a cool Civil War letter set to share for tomorrow morning.
Very exciting and informative post shared followed . @winstonalden Wish you the best with all your future endeavors.
Its fascinating to see historical photos. You've done a great job restoring them...
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This is cool - I'd be honored to have your support.
I'm glad you enjoyed the photos!
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Thanks to OCD team I found your post and I like it because I love sometimes to go back in time in my family's box with old photos too. I love to pay attention to details like clothes, attitude of people or things around. Congratulations for your post!
I'm so glad you enjoyed the old photos! It's quite a project getting them scanned and preserved so I'm glad to know that other folks enjoy them besides me.
I'm currently scanning and sharing a box of letters that my great-great-great grandmother sent her husband during the American Civil War in 1864. They're full of great detail about domestic life in the 19th century. If you're interested the first post is here, with a link on the bottom to the rest.
Thanks for the vote and comment!
I have a scant few photos of relations from the first half of the 20th century, and that's it. Not as avid photographers in my family as yours, or perhaps other relations in Canada have piles of photos I don't know about. That's one of the problems with being a fairly recent US family - no old homesteads. And as far as I know, the farm in New Brunswick my grandma grew up on is long gone. My grandfather on the other side fled Germany in the build up to WWII and all but one uncle were killed when they tried to follow - so I have even less on that side!