I have become obsessed with the “100-Year-Old Photo Blog” called Shorpy. They have a truly remarkable collection of beautiful Americana on film. Below are some of my favorites. If you click on the photo, you can enlarge to hi-res to get a closer look. You can also order a variety of prints from the archive through the Shorpy site – should you desire. If you were wondering, the web site’s name comes from a 14 year old Alabama boy named Shorpy Higginbotham. Natch.
“Yale-Colgate Football.” New Haven, Oct. 23, 1954, with Ralph, Dan and Richie, a few months after Richie (standing) graduated from Colgate U.
Houston, October 1913. “Eleven-year-old Western Union messenger #51. J.T. Marshall. Been day boy here for five months. Goes to Red Light district some and knows some of the girls.” Photograph by Lewis Wickes Hine.
1924. Washington Canoe Club rowers on the Potomac near the recently finished Key Bridge and older Aqueduct Bridge. National Photo Co.
January 1941. Lowell, Mass. “Commuters who have just come off the train, waiting for the bus to go home.” 35mm Kodachrome by Jack Delano.
Washington. D.C. One of six National Photo glass negatives from 1921 labeled “Krazy Kat,” showing a group of college-age kids painting and smoking in the yard of what seems to be a club or restaurant. Which has a tree house.
December 1941. Goodyear Aircraft, Akron, Ohio. “Formerly an aircraft dock, this huge building, thought to be the largest in the world with no interior supports, is now the scene of many busy shops turning out aircraft parts. Either new housing close to the plant or vastly improved public transportation will eventually have to be supplied, for the tires on the cars of the workers, and perhaps even the cars themselves, will in many instances give in before the end of the present emergency.” 4×5 Kodachrome transparency by Alfred Palmer.