June 29, 2015

Bespectacled Victorian Czechoslovakian in profile

By C.E. Ryan
CDV. Private Collection.

1890s CDV. Private Collection.

A very interesting little CDV, both unique and beautiful, of a young man in profile with glasses on his nose.

He’s wearing some fine and unusual evening wear. The details are amazing like the diamond shaped buttons on the white shirt, and the looped ones on the slim coat. His bowtie looks made of velvet.

His hair also feels like an anachronism.

Back of CDV. V. Donat & J. Tomas

Back of CDV. V. Donat & J. Tomas

Photographer: V. Donat & J. Tomas. Prague. Czech Republic (the Austro Hungarian Empire at the time).

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June 29, 2015

‘Mary’ is so wrong!

By C.E. Ryan
Mary. Postcard. Private Collection.

1905 Mary with the umbrella. Postcard. Private Collection.

First of all, this isn’t Mary, more like Marc in a skirt and wig. This postcard got me in stitches. Wrong Mary is, on so many levels! The picture is only half of it, the text is priceless. The umbrella looks quite threatening too.

Photographer: Robert McCrum. 1905.

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June 29, 2015

Catwalk on Main Street USA

By C.E. Ryan
RPPC. Private Collection.

1940s gentleman walking in a three-piece suit and fedora. RPPC. Private Collection.

A WWII era gentleman on Main St. U.S.A strutting his stuff hand in pocket, the other holding a cigarette. I love the white shoes to match the fedora, even though on this picture they’re blending into the sunlit ground.  The three-piece suit with the fitted waist and loose pants gave this man the very classic business-like and sharp look of the decade.

The store behind the man is Kress (S.H. Kress & Co.), a popular American “five and dime” department store chain which operated from 1896 to 1981.

RPPC: AGFA/ANSCO 1930s-1940s

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June 28, 2015

The photographer with the wet plate camera

By C.E. Ryan
Snapshot. Private Collection.

RPPC sized snapshot. Private Collection.

This is a cute, artistic snapshot probably taken in the 1930s or 40s, yet the young photographer holding the stylus looks like he’s standing next to what I believe is a wet plate collodion camera (so the snapshot is not of his reflection).

He looks like he’s getting ready to take a picture. In his days tintypes were already considered vintage.

Creative Commons License
Digital restoration work titled The Photographer With Wet Plate Camera by Caroline C. Ryan is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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June 26, 2015

The happiest little cabinet card on earth

By C.E. Ryan
'The happiest gent on a cabinet card'. Private Collection.

Man laughing on cabinet card, by Dan Cleave. Private Collection.

My starry-eyed self HAD to add this very happy gent to my collection! And my regular followers know exactly why.

What a picture! Isn’t his laughter just contagious? I’m in love with this. What did the photographer tell his sitter to catch him laughing his head off like this? But whatever Dan Cleave did or say, hats off!

This is a very rare sight on a cabinet card, and such a lovely and precious moment caught at just the right time. The way he wears his straw boater hat too. As you can imagine, this is an absolute favorite of mine. And he’s got a nice set of teeth too. :)

The card has golden scalloped edges. I date this wonderful photograph to be from the 1890s to early 1900s.

Photographer: Dan Cleave. Dexter. Iowa. Back is blank.

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