Middle Aged Woman With Brooch

I'm not even going to take a guess on when these two pictures were taken other than to say that they're probably not too old. This lady has the all most generic look of middle aged woman transitioning into an early old age. Also, the look of an official portrait, a teacher, local council member, or church lady. Say aged 50 to 60. A bit of a snarl in the first picture.

A Third Creighton?

In the last two posts, I've put up CDVs of Kate Creighton, who I think is the mother of Louise Creighton, featured in the second of the two Creighton collections. Is this a third Creighton? This portrait is labeled "Kate Creighton" but the hair is straight and a different color. I thought it might have been mislabeled, but the chin shape differs from Louise and is much closer to Kate. There is a third possibility. While it is far more common for sons to named after fathers, it's not unheard of to name a daughter for a mother. The one thing that I'm curious about is that this young lady has pierced ears. Nothing decorative about the photographers stamp on this one, so I didn't bother to scan it in. "JOHN P. ORR. Photographer, 4 doors East of Lowery House, Jefferson Street, BUTLER, PA"

Louise Creighton, the Daughter

In my last post, I put up a CDV of Kate Creighton, a young woman who I think was very likely the mother of Louise Creighton, the subject of this post. Kate had her picture taken in Philadelphia, PA, while Louise had hers done in western Pennsylvania. The oval photograph with the water stains along the edges was taken at the Mammoth Gallery, McIntire & Co. studio from Butler, Pennsylvania, north of Pittsburgh. The clean oval, and what seems to be the middle image in age range, was from Triece's in Blairsville, PA, east of Pittsburgh. And finally, H. Bishop from Pittsburgh, itself. And no, it's not a misprint. There was a time in the 19th century when Pittsburgh lost the H.

Kate Creighton, the Mother

I have five images of the Creighton family, this one of the mother and three more of the daughter which will be posted within the next couple of days, and a wild card mystery image. This carte de visite was taken by a photographer in Philadelphia. The child, taken at three different ages was taken by three different photographers in three different communities in western Pennsylvania.

Manipulated

Back when I worked at the photo lab, the digital dept. guys kept wanting to make the silly argument that digital was superior because it could be manipulated. Well, this image is from the 19th century, and it has been manipulated. I'm not sure how it was done, other than the general observation that coloring was added to give it a painterly look. I suspect that the original was bleached back to an almost ghost like density, and then the inks were added. By the by, bleaching back an image is done before a print is made a sepia tone.

Carte de Visite, CDV With Hat

This CDV was rather crudely made. I used the scanner to square up the image, but the actual picture, an albumen print, was trimmed out with a very ragged edge, and then pasted, off center, on the card. Unlike the Daguerreotype and ambrotype, carte de visites were cheap to produce, and made it possible for lower income people to have their picture taken and for a young man on the make to get into a non labor profession for a small up front investment. The high collar makes the subject look very statue like, at least to me.

The Rocking Horse Chair

I know that I've written that I'm not all that interested in pictures of children, and that hasn't changed. Like the Betty Jane Easterly post (9-10-10) I'm fascinated by the kid's toy as well as the contrast with the Easterly picture. Betty Jane had an expensive looking, factory built toy car. This child has what looks like a hand made rocking chair made to look like a horse. Click on the image to blow it up and the rough cut texture of the foot board can be more clearly seen. And the painted horse imagery, very folk art.