WPA

This is a strange one. The signs around the necks of the actors reads WPA. The Works Progress Administration was from the great depression, but the hair styles would suggest the 1950's. Too, the actors look like they are from high school. The black face make-up on the MC is also unexpected from a WPA arts project play.

Hollywood Dwarfs

From the days when I worked at the photo lab. The original, the sepia toned print, is a small 4X5 theatrical print of a dwarf act. I put it up on a copy camera, made a negative, and then made the black and white print, also posted here. The image is credited to Peralta. Fed them name into Google, and couldn't find anything helpful.

A Long, Narrow Portrait

This is a strangely proportioned old portrait, only four inches wide, but nine and a half long. The reflective quality is from photographic silver that's leaching out of the paper. From the twenties, would be my best guess, and early twenties at that. It came in a cardboard folder marked, "K.M.L. & ART Co. INC. GRAND RAPIDS MICH." She does look pretty arty, so the studio name fits. She looks like she eventually went to New York or Paris.

Topsy's Cafe, Dining and Dancing

All I could find on Topsy's Cafe was that it is no longer in business, and I would have been shocked to find out otherwise. No names written on the folder, which I've found is not the rule on these things. Usually the owner writes out the name of most of the people in the pictures. Printed on the back cover, "For Additional Prints Write To TOPSY'S CAFE. Pictures are $1.25 each, including Tax and Mailing Charges. Picture No._ Date JAN. 5, 1945" Less than a year until war's end. To see other souvenir photo folders from the days when people went to night clubs, click on night clubs, or souvenir photo folders in the labels section at the bottom of the post. I've got a number of them in the collection.

A Desert Base

I just picked up another small collection of estate photos, and in time I'll publish the lot. Most are family pictures, primarily of interest for the old fashions and cars. This photograph, though, is the reason I bought the collection. One long image pieced together from five individual prints. (My scanner is 12 inches on it's longest dimension, this collage is almost 15 inches long, which is why I've put it up in three different slices.) It has to be some sort of World War 2 era military base or research sight. When I first saw it, I thought it was from the Johnson Valley in California's high, Mojave Desert, but the fact is, there isn't enough there to verify a location. The Johnson Valley, during the war, was used for tank and bomber training. The odds are against it, but what would really be exciting is if this were from one of the A-bomb test sights in Nevada.

A Cross Dressing Proposal

The man kneeling, proposing to his girlfriend, is clearly a woman, but is the young lady receiving the proposal a man? It sure looks that way. As I've noted before, I spent years working in photo labs, and I don't think I ever had a week go by when I didn't print some sort of picture with a sexual theme. I've done lots of amateur nudes, lingerie shots, hard core sex, and the surprisingly popular cross dressing images. Give the guy some credit, he went all out. The makeup is pretty good, he shaved his legs, and learned to walk in heels.

The Sad Stripper

Stamped on the back of these two photos, "Foto Wachs Uckeritz/Usedom F/III/9/251." Clearly from Germany, Austria, or maybe the German speaking section of Switzerland. Judging by the hair styles, and clothing I'd bet sometime in the early 1950's, a time when West Germany and Austria were still in pretty bad shape. It looks like this lady was out at a club or on holiday, and got called up on stage for a little amateur entertainment. I know it's a fools errand to read too much into old photographs, but that's half the fun. She looks like she's pretty unhappy to be giving a strip show, no matter how mild it turned out to be.