A European Village Wedding

Must of us have had the experience of looking at an old photograph and knowing where it must have been taken.  There's nothing written anywhere on this picture.  I could have been taken almost anywhere, but when I look at it it says Europe to me.  Not the Europe of Paris, Prague or Berlin, but the Europe of a small village somewhere in eastern, or perhaps southern Europe.  I'll bet the photographer was a local shop keeper who had a side line taking photos.  An old piece of canvas was hung up on the wall to provide an even background, and a glass negative, the same size as the finished photo, was exposed.  Maybe the married couple moved to the United States and brought this print with them.. Maybe they mailed it to their emigrant cousin.  Who knows how it got here.  But then again, maybe I'm wrong.  Maybe this image was made in Iowa.

Lost In the Snow

I know, they're not actually lost in the snow.  But the composition is so interesting.  Did the photographer mean to frame like this, or was it a mistake?  Was he trying to show just how much it had snowed?  I like the lady on the left in her full length fur coat.

Sitting At Christmas

Demented Grandpa prevents little Emily from playing with new doll.  Bad Grandpa, bad!  Dated "DEC 70"  No other information.

Posing In the Snow

I don't know whether these two photos are related or not, but I did find them in the same place, they look very similar, so I'm posting them together.  Because of the hat, I can't be sure, but I think it might be the same woman.  Call it small town America, in the twenties, in winter. 

Winter Sports In the Dolomites

Written on the back of the second photograph, "Selva  Dolomiten, Dezember 1956"

Selve refers to a small community in the Dolomite Mountains in the  South Tyrol region of northern Italy, Selva di Val Gardena, or as it's known in German, Wolkenstein in Groden.

 So why all the German?  Pretty simple, actually.  The South Tyrol was once part of Austria-Hungary.  At the beginning of World War 1, there were two political blocks in Europe.  The Triple Entente, Great Britain, France, and Russia, and the Triple Alliance, Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy.  When the war started, Italy dropped out of the alliance.  In 1915, the British promised the Italians the South Tyrol if they'd switch sides and declare war on the Germans and the Austro-Hungarian Empire.  The Italians didn't do all that well in the actual fighting, but after the war, they were able to annex the South Tyrol.  Despite attempts to "Italianize" the area, the majority of people still speak German.  In Selva, 89% speak Ladin, a local dialect.  The remaining 11% are about equally divided between Italian and German.

Merry Christmas 1952

I have a confession to make.  I don't really like Christmas all that much.  My parents split up when I was young, and Christmas day was when they made their one effort of the year to be civil to each other.  It lasted about five minutes.  But for those whole love Christmas, a couple of cute kids standing in the snow, dated "Dec 1952"

Tapolcza

Tapolcza is a small town in Hungary.  As of the last census, it had 17,598 residents.  I was able to translate Palyaudvar as railway station, but the hand writing on the back is just too small and indistinct to be translated by someone who doesn't actually speak Hungarian.  I also need help with the postmark.  I think it's from August 10, 1916, but again, the design isn't something I'm familiar with.  It could also be from 1910.

If it is from 1916, this postcard would have been mailed right in the middle of World War 1.  Budapest would not have been the capitol of Hungary, it would have been a city in Austria-Hungary, a country that wouldn't survive the war.