Non-cat photo

Teddy Bear

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Today’s photo was a photo postcard and it was cut down at some point into this more or less perfect square. Man, the mind boggles a bit at what the rest of it looked like and why it was ultimately cropped – to fit in a frame perhaps?

It comes to me via @marsh.and.meadow on Instagram. While my usual gig with them is jewelry (see one of those posts here), I find that Heather (Hagens) has expanded over time and other tidbits come over the transom. Of course some of them catch the interest of Pictorama. She has expanded her footprint to @marsh.and.meadow.overflow for most of these non-jewelry items. Even for what I don’t buy, I admit to enjoying the passing parade of eyeball kicks.

There is writing on the back and it was mailed. The cancellation survives and it was mailed from Detroit on July 28, 1912 at 8:00 PM. It was mailed to, Hildie Cullen (the name cuts off here), in Nellie, Ohio. A few words exist down the side but not enough to string together, it was a dense note of sorts.

Back of the card. Looks as if there was a whole story being told on the left side.

It wasn’t for the man in drag I purchased this photo, but for the very large, marvelous teddy bear, who stands on his haunches and bears arms! He comes up to the man’s elbow.

If teddies came into being in 1902 (famously Roosevelt declined to shoot a small cornered black bear and the toy was invent and dubbed in his honor) this is how Teddy has grown in a decade. He could be a Steiff made bear and they had plenty of time to grow them this large. He reminds me of my beloved enormous Felix toys which people will pose with across the ocean in another decade or so.

(I can’t say much for the visuals on this, but I thought I’d share Bing singing The Teddy Bear’s picnic for the heck of it below.)

Meanwhile, I wonder if the gun the bear holds is a sort of salute to the Roosevelt story which certainly was likely still in popular memory at that time. It appears that somehow Teddy has an empty Coke bottle balanced on his head as well. Could he be both shooter and target practice here?

The man, carrying a parasol, is in a long flowered print skirt which would have been an old one even for the time. (I’m saying he is not fashionably attired!) He maintains his man’s shirt and a tie, but sports, upon very close inspection, some greenery (leaves) stuffed in his shirt and some sort of ribbon pinned to it. His basket is loaded with some posies and more of the same leafy greens.

I thought he was an older man, but the same close inspection shows that he is young. (Perhaps that shouldn’t surprise me.) His man’s boots just about make it into the photo of the cropped edge, peaking out under the long skirt.

Behind him we see a barnyard scene of doors open and closed. It may have been sent in July, but it looks as if the ground is littered in leaves making me wonder if it wasn’t take in the fall and maybe for Halloween. The quality of the photo isn’t great, a bit over-exposed so it is hard to say. Whoever cut it down had a good eye for composition and it works well in this square format.

It is of course the teddy that earned this photo a place in the Pictorama archive, but it is a well cared for picture and I am glad that it has come to rest in a place where we can enjoy it.

Ducks, Geese and Chickens

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: This photo postcard makes me think about my mother who loved ducks, geese and swans. Frankly she was less romantic about chickens which she grew up around although she bore them no ill will and being a vegan did not eat them nor their eggs. Mom did tell stories about her childhood and how they roosted in the neighbors trees and would occasionally torment her on her way to or from school.

It’s a pity this photo was poorly made, overexposed and with an odd sloppy line of poor printing at the bottom. (I have improved it some before sharing with you.) However my mom would have liked this card.

Those things notwithstanding, it is a compelling image and caught my eye online a week or so back and I purchased it for the house here in New Jersey. It is a photo postcard and was never used.

Photo of a photo of the house I grew up in.

As some readers know, I grew up in a house on an inlet of a river here, the Shrewsbury River. It was within walking distance of the ocean and as a result my childhood was full of time on the water – swimming in the ocean and walking the beach or crabbing off our dock or taking a rowboat out in the backyard. Mom’s nascent passion for animals first took the form of cats and dogs, strays and kittens that needed home.

However, later in life mom started feeding a flock of swans inhabiting the secluded inlet near our house. Then, slowly, she started helping out with an injured swan, goose or duck. Before long she was traveling to fetch a stranded pinioned one here or one that swallowed fishing line there. Betty became the go to for injured waterfowl for not just the surrounding counties but even in the surrounding states. Swans and geese that could not be released back into the wild were placed in areas in New York and New Jersey with appropriately large water bodies where food would be available and people would care for them.

A dahlia also on the hummingbird path of nectar.

Betty fought for these birds as well as other animals – helping to shut down puppy mills, purveyors of sick dogs. So many rescued bunnies found a home in our backyard that they were all so tame they would come right up to you if you sat out in the yard. I would come to New Jersey for a visit and the guest bathroom would be commandeered by a swan. Even at the same time, a rescued cat might be healing in an upstairs room. Somehow it all seemed quite natural at the time. Or at least it was our normal.

Strawberry plant currently on the deck which seems to be a happy stop for hummingbirds.

In her last years mom had a commanding view of the deck and the yard from the chair she spent virtually all her time in. It was planted for the explicit pleasure of birds, bees and butterflies. However, it wasn’t until after her death that I started spending time outside here and on the deck and began to realize how successful she was. Furry bees buzz busily everywhere, but especially early in the morning and evening. Hawks fly overhead, but sparrows, robins and a host of other birds amass. Bunnies of the more shy variety nibble greens in the yard – I think they and the chipmunks eat more heartily when unobserved, or so it seems from the consumption of my berries and veg.

Front of the NJ house earlier this week.

Most notably I never knew about the hummingbirds. I have loved the idea of them from the first I learned about them in sixth grade, but it was years before I saw one in person. I used to try to temp them to feeders with syrup water concoctions. It turns out that they love this yard! They appear to have a path from my dahlias, to a strawberry plant with bright red flowers and then to two Rose of Sharon trees (one white and one purple) that technically belong to my neighbor but hang heavily over my side of the fence. and amazingly enough, if I sit quietly on the porch long enough, one will pause en route, pausing, suspended in front of me in greeting.

Uncle Zack

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: As I start writing this post I am in New Jersey on Saturday evening with Beauregard, the huge all black cat, who is the master of this NJ Butler house. It is the end of several sunny days of stay here and I will head home tomorrow – potentially completing this on the train if I cannot before.

This photo postcard came to me via eBay and is an odd choice for me. This little girl with her chicken on a leash charmed me. Small children with pet chickens seems to be popular on the internet these days so poultry pets remain popular. Working for a veterinary hospital with an active Exotics service, we see a fair number of chickens. (Presumably chickens that are for eating go to a different sort of vet than us although obviously we’d care for one in need if presented!)

The little girl is nicely dressed in trousers and boots with a somewhat sporty coat with a design of the buttons across her shoulder and chest. She looks quite happy as does the (large) chicken on a string leash. There’s one or two other chickens, behind a fence in the distance who look on and the soil looks dusty. The nearest vegetation we can see are trees way off in the distance and the sun is casting long shadows. Given her attire, it was chilly.

This card was never sent and looks like it was quite beloved, handled. It is undated, but on the back in a child’s neatest script it says uncle zack.

Many years ago I remember my mother had a video of a woman she knew slightly about her and her pet chicken. I don’t remember the chicken’s name, but it lived in the house, primarily in a sort of all season room at the front of the house. A cared for pet chicken might live to be ten or twelve years old according to the internet, I actually thought it was older. The chicken in the video went everywhere with this woman – today it might have been considered a comfort animal.

Recently in a talk given to staff to celebrate diversity, one of the vet’s pointed out that some clients feel that people belittle their choice of an usual animal and express surprise that they would pay so much for the care of a fish, tiny turtle or perhaps chicken or duck. (I also heard about surgery on a goldfish recently which fascinated me! The surgeon was evidently personally quite fond of goldfish and frustrated by a common cause of death in them he was able to improve but not resolve the fish-y issue.) However, as animal lovers our heart knows no such boundaries and be it pigeon or porcupine we are committed to them and find great happiness with critters in all species, shapes and sizes.

Moon Woman

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: A Pictorama part two post with this framed postcard. The frame was purchased first and much earlier than the postcard. I picked that up from @marsh.and.meadow.overflow in a sale of odds and ends. It’s a beaut! I knew I would find a use for it and even though I was on something of a money diet at the moment I jumped at putting it in my electronic cart. It has some age on it and sports a decorative faux wood design. The back is very old, probably more fitted to sitting up on a desk or table than hanging on the wall, although I guess we’ve figured that out too.

After it arrived and perhaps even in my mental machinations, I realized that the right postcard in it would make a dandy gift for Kim. Although I spend a lot of time with cat photos obviously, I was looking for something more Deitchian for him.

I felt truly inspired when I ran across a set of these Art Nouveau postcards, once again on Instagram, from a seller I have followed for a while but never purchased from, @ghost_era. Presented as a group in a series but sold individually I zeroed in on this one immediately – although I admit to being tempted to buy several! (A few remain available at their shop at Ghost Era Antiques.) Hard to explain but this photo postcard seemed to be perfection.

Another Reutlinger photo postcard, not in Pams-Pictorama.com Collection.

I’m not sure exactly why I love this photo so much but I really do; the woman, the moon and the radiating light, and then the stars! It epitomizes a certain kind of picture. There is the subtle color, from yellow to blue. I like the way some of the stars have been left bright white though for emphasis. The moon has some mottling (a nod to the man there?) and a deep shadow behind her. The woman is in a sort of nightgown dress – she’s dreaming? We are?

It would appear that this card was produced by the photographer Léopold-Émile Reutlinger (March 17, 1863 – March16, 1937). His uncle founded a Parisian photography studio where his father worked as the photographer. (Léopold’s son Jean became a prominent photographer too although sadly died in WWI.) Both photographed the rich and most importantly famous of the day, but he took the family business to a new height and is the one remembered today. I wonder if this is due to the popularity of photo postcards and I would think in part this Art Nouveau style which he excelled at.

I gave this to Kim last year. And yes! I believe that is the trademark R for Reutlinger at the bottom right!

As I look over his work online I can’ help but wonder if a few of the other postcards in my collection can be attributed to him. I am thinking of a Valentine’s Day gift I gave Kim last year below. (Post can be read here.)

In 1930, Reutlinger suffered an accident with a champagne cork, (weird sort of irony, yes?) which cost him an eye and seriously affected his profession. But he continued to run the studio until his death in Paris in 1937.

Meanwhile, Kim has a good spot on the wall over his desk picked out for it, above a Frank Borzage still from Lucky Star. Some rearranging needs to go on first but I look forward to seeing it there along with a few other Borzage stills we are swapping in for other photos. (A post on those stills can be found here and here.) Maybe a future post on the walls here at Deitch Studio. For now, enjoy the rest of this holiday weekend if you are reading in real time.

Still Life with Nick Carter

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Today’s post is the first of a few highlighting things I gave Kim for his birthday this year, celebrated last week at the time of writing this. Kim doesn’t like a lot of fuss over his birthday, but I try to find something he’s either wanted or failing that, like this year, some original bits. (A past post of a birthday gift can be found here.)

Today’s photo is tiny, only sort of 2.25″x 2.75″ or so. I ran across it on my Instagram feed via @baleighfaucz and it whispered Kim! at me a bit so here we are. In addition to being small (smaller in fact than I anticipated) it has these two deep creases in it. These are of course unfortunate, but they do not rob me of any pleasure in getting a glimpse into a little world of long ago offered up here.

I cannot say I can identify everything in the image. The Nick Carter, Secret Agent Weekly, is from April 20, 1912 and cost 5 cents – seems like a princely sum actually. I think it was this that put me in the mind of Kim as he has passed through a few dime novel stages, although not to say he’s a fan of Nick Carter in particular. According to Wikipedia Detective Nick Carter leapt onto the scene in 1886 (Kim is telling me he and Sherlock Holmes hit the scene at roughly the same time), and had an extraordinary meandering run through more than a century beyond, hitting incarnations in various forms of popular media from dime novels to radio and beyond, with a most recent stop as a series of novels that were produced from 1964-1990.

This tiny image is the only color version I could find on the internet.

A pipe, cigarettes, cigar and a pocket watch are in the foreground although in front of them is some sort of small paper package I can’t identify and in the lower right corner something utterly lost on me. A decorative beer stein is perched on a well used Central Union Cut Plug tobacco tin. One site selling such a tin says they were often used as lunch pails once depleted. This one appears to still host tobacco.

Saw some pricey perfect versions for sale but at the time of writing you could have this one for $20 on eBay.

An odd illustration which is entitled simply Life in script at the top and appears to be of two men at a dinner table with a menu, one in evening cloths and a plumed hat and the other dressed as a woman is at the back. Can’t imagine the importance of it to the photographer although it serves as sort of a title for the image overall.

Looking at a few of these objects in color makes me wonder if he was disappointed with it in black and white. It is a dynamic little photo, but my guess is that the colors were pretty punchy in person.

I love to think of the photographer, maybe a young man back in the spring of 1912, setting up this photo. They were likely a nascent enthusiast as home photography was still just becoming popular. It is sort of sweet to think of a serious young fellow studiously putting this together, (why these particular things? smoking, reading, drinking) showing us a slice of his life that we can consider so many decades later.

Felix in the Nursery

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: I pulled this photo off of a small pile on my desk this morning. Purchased several months back, it has awaited its turn up at bat. It is neither professional, nor significantly profound, but delightful in its own way.

It is a 2″x 4″ photo with nothing written and no identifying information on the back, although it appears to have been printed by a skilled hand. The Felix is the only thing really to date the image and I would assume that it was during the zenith of his popularity, most likely the 1920’s, but perhaps as late as the early 1930’s is my guess.

Baby is playing with a baby doll which is always a touch of irony for me – and this doll looks remarkably like the kid. The Felix surveying all around him is a very classic chalkware or composition model. Oddly, I don’t actually own this particular very popular item – in part perhaps because they are fragile and I have a general aversion to large, easily broken items. Still, in considering him here and online this morning, I will say I should wait for a nice example and grab it. He would look splendid surveying the living room or bedroom in New Jersey. Let’s see if I achieve that goal in coming months.

These Felix-es are touted as carnival prizes, but I have never really accepted that as their origin. There are slightly cheaper, more slightly off-model versions which I assume fit this bill, but these always seemed a bit nicer than that. Evidently some have mobile arms and this fellow looks like he might be a candidate for being such a high class item.

The kid, as far as the viewer can tell, wears only shoes (nice sheepskin trimmed ones, perhaps all the better to start to walk in?) and we’ll assume a diaper. He or she is sitting in such a very nice sunny spot it gives me a cat-like yen to locate it and curl up in it – and nap. The curtains are helping the composition of this photo considerably, creating a pattern through out and catching the sun up in front. The shadows play nicely across the baby and around him. These are massive windows (I vaguely assume that the child is on the floor so they go all the way up!), and the sun streams in at the front and is in deep shade in the back of the room.

As I write it is in fact a sunny Sunday morning here in Manhattan, a relief after a week of pouring and sometimes teeming rain, so perhaps I am sun sensitive and craving as I write. I doggedly remind myself of April showers bringing May flowers, but we are soggy here and revel in the relief. Next weekend I will go to Jersey and check out the garden there and try to turn my mind to spring and summer. Time to put the lettuces in I think, or soon anyway. Growing things and time out in the yard will be the best harbingers of the season and the remedy for the blues, not to mention a visit with the New Jersey kitties.

Within

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: This is a tiny post – at least in that it refers to two petit specimens that arrived in the mail recently, about 30% smaller than I had estimated. These boxes are however still so charming that I am taken with them despite not knowing what use I can put them to. They appeared on my Instagram feed (via @marsh.and.meadow) and on a whim I bought them.

Some of you readers already know I can’t resist a box. I have opined on my love of them before in posts here and here. There is something endlessly comforting about containers – those which promise to hold things, give them a place, put them away appropriately. (In all honesty, it isn’t like I actually always employ them for these rarified purposes once I have them, but it is the thought that counts.)

My original inspirations was that the larger of the two could hold the unruly pushpins on my desk in my office. The fact is that my office is such a mess these days I can’t begin to imagine how I could have focused on pushpins.

Due to construction at our main building I work in a mostly residential high rise tower about a block away. There is a hallway which houses a disparate bunch of us – my fellow fundraisers, various administrative staff, a clutch of doctors and a few data scientists who have recently joined the ranks. My office is spacious enough if remarkably blue in color – I am talking walls. (It lends a certain Smurfness to my Zoom encounters.) We only have partial walls so remarks are occasionally tossed over the wall to the pathologist on one side or the educator on the other – while we simultaneously pretend we can’t hear everyone’s conversations. My job requires a lot of talking, on the phone and with staff, so I am sorry for them as I know I have destroyed any peace and quiet.

The undeniably jolly Rescue container. I have less stress just playing with it!

However, the main point about my office is that it leaks terribly. Skylights that are river facing and given rain and wind coming off the river water pours into my office. The landlord does not seem able or inclined to fix it so this week I packed up the whole thing and we rearranged the cabinets and furniture so my desk is no longer under the leak. I lost about a day of work and am still not unpacked, but I have the additional advantage of being in a sunnier spot under said skylights and my weekends and evenings will be calmer not thinking about whether or not I remembered to stick a plastic kitty litter bin under the leak.

However, somehow in all of that I managed to have a moment to be annoyed that the pushpins for the bulletin board were in an ugly plastic container that tends to spill. This was my solution. And, in all fairness, the larger of the two would probably hold sufficient pushpins for daily desktop needs, even if a tad smaller than planned.

The larger of the two is emblazoned with Pastilles Halda and some related prose which roughly translates to being the best for mouth and throat irritations, larynx and bronchial affections (infections?). Pastilles, melt in your mouth sugar pills, were for various maladies having made their first appearance in France in 1825. Those appear to have been for stomach trouble.

Surprise! Found inside the larger container.

Both boxes are of a hard cardboard, but it is still a bit amazing that they reached down decades to us intact. I will try to be good stewards of them. The sides of each is brightly patterned making them attractive and festive which likely contributed to their longevity.

When I opened the blue one, there was this lovely tiny photo below saying hello. Thank you @marsh.and.meadow! That was a wonderful little surprise. I could do a whole post on this amazing little girl in a huge hat. More or less a one inch square she peers out from under the huge brim, a mass of curls falling behind her. Her attention has been caught looking off to the side where someone was clearly trying to induce her to smile – in the end I think they got the best photo anyway.

Pams-Pictorama.com Collection.

Meanwhile, pastilles remain with us today – cough drops and the like. They have slid toward gummies more than hard confections. I’m a fan of a good gummie (am devoted to Rescue Remedy ones that have melatonin to help me sleep), but to soothe a sore throat I like a hard, cherry Ludens myself.

This larger of these two sport eucalyptus and menthol as ingredients. It brings childhood to mind and the various types of cough drops I was plied with. There were the honey and menthol ones that were the most serious, the soft Smith Brothers ones that also came in a honey flavor and then the cherry Ludens which, although I liked them best, were probably lowest on the scale for effectiveness but the most like candy.

These days I reach for Riccola when I need a serious cough drop. They appeared late in my childhood, closer to young adulthood. I usually keep a few on hand in case a fit of coughing overcomes me or a guest in my office. I still lean toward cherry, but they are very no nonsense it doesn’t really matter.

The Ludens box of my youth.

My friends over at Bach, who make the Rescue products as mentioned above, serve up their line of stress reducing pastilles in a most charming yellow tin with a very satisfying and clever pop top. It is worth having one around just to play with the tin. Sadly the aforementioned melatonin gummies come in a very average bottle, and are in fact too large for this jolly receptacle.

The smaller box appears to have held saffron from Belgium – not medicinal at all. Saffron, which is a notoriously expensive spice, generally comes in tiny receptacles (glass mostly these days, not much bigger than a pill casing) and is of course bright orange. There is no sign of this on the interior of the box so the saffron must have been further wrapped.

Neither of the companies associated with these boxes appear to exist today, although there is a Valda rather than Halda French pastille company that seems to have a fair amount of market share. I could not find a history for it so I don’t know if these are the roots of same or not.

Perhaps once everything is once again put away at work I will share photos of the new office rearranged. I think it could use a few more photos and maybe another toy or two before it is really home away from home however.

Mourning

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: This unusual photo was a birthday gift from a good friend (thank you @eileentravell) which she gave me recently. It a large, half plate, tintype. Aside from a bent corner, some chewed up edges and that odd ding on her dress near the chair, it is in fairly good shape.

As I started spending time with the image it confused me a bit admittedly. She is in what I have to assume is mourning, her all black attire, down to her black fur muff. Her clothing best dates this to my mind is probably the 1890’s. There is some relief in the white lace ruffle and the middle to light gray of her hat, something light colored like a handkerchief peeping out of her pocket.

Hair mourning brooch given to me by a friend. Pams-Pictorama.com Collection.

She looks grave and pale as she leans on the prop chair, covered in this cloth with a patterned edge. The background prop is a bit sad and cheesy as well, a view out a faux window, hangs a bit askew and folds below it. The carpet defines the space that she is atop, but that too ends at the front edge of the picture.

Detail. Pams-Pictorama.com Collection.

Most interesting to me is that her cheeks have ever so slightly and delicately been pinkened by a gentle hand, which is not at all always the case in the toning of such photos. Yet, looking at her I wonder why they bothered as she is deeply in her own world of grief.

In fact, I find it interesting that such a photo was even made. Why would you want to record this period of grief in this young woman’s life? (If you look closely, she is young despite these trappings which bring a sort of middle age to mind.) I don’t know if that sort of recording of mourning was part of the intricate ways of observing the various rituals or not.

Pams-Pictorama.com Collection. This mourning locket tells a whole story in the March of ’22 post highlighted below.

I never realized until recently that beyond black and gray there were lighter shades of mourning and that people would progress to lavender and even light blue. I found this out recently when someone was selling a light blue enamel piece of mourning jewelry online. While it certainly predates her, Queen Victoria really kicked off the dictates of the all black mourning of the time and rigid rules of society bound the clothing jewelry and behavior of the bereaved. At least a year of wearing black and that included jewelry which was largely made of jet or black glass which was less temperamental and therefore less expensive. Much is said about the clothing, jewelry and rituals in the late 19th to early 20th century novels I have been reading.

An example in blue enamel pulled off the internet. Ring dated 1794.

Rings and brooches adorned with bits of hair, images and later even photographs record the attachment to the lost beloved.

After the first year a progression to gray, mauve and purple were acceptable over time and that included jewelry of amethyst and garnet stones. Pearls were allusions to the tears of the wearer which I had never heard before, but many mourning pieces are decorated with them. (I recently heard that some Asian cultures view pearls that way as well.) I have written about some mourning pieces in my own collection, most given to me but others I purchased. These wearable memorials fascinate me. Those posts can be found here, here and here. (Oddly each of these posts have appeared in late March in different years – a spring thing?)

The idea of lavender and even light blue (enamel rings and lockets) in the latter stages of mourning, probably two years or more out, interests me – the point of emerging, yet still recognizing your loss and the process. I have seen lavender clothing as well from that state, but not sure I ever saw blue associated with it. For me the light blue, that final stage perhaps, is a sign of sending you back into the world of spring and blue skies again.

Louise Groody with a Little Bit of Felix

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Pams-Pictorama.com Post: Today’s Pictorama oddball exclusive is this April, 1928 Theater Magazine page featuring stage star of the day Louise Groody. Shown here at age 21 by my calculation she grasps a perfectly delightful fluffy white pooch and a mysterious equally fluffy (if unable to achieve the same level of actual cuteness) creature in the other arm. She herself is dressed in fur. A very of-the-moment cloche hat covers her hair and shades her eyes in this carefully composed composition. A well trained smile outlined in carefully colored lips and revealing very even pearly teeth.

The bottom of the page reads, Pets, All of Them, Especially Louise Groody, the Hit in Hit the Deck. Below: After more than a year’s successful run in New York, Miss Groody, with the rest of the company, have folded their tricks at the Belasco and silently stolen away, despite the insistent demand of late-comers. They are now on tour, covering the principal cities. (Confidential: The small animal clinging to Miss Groody’s right arm is a honey bear, sweetness – and quite light.) Felix the cat is left out in the cold.

Hit the Deck was one of Groody’s most popular hits. Here she sings Sometimes I’m Happy from the show.

The little Felix is odd – no idea really why he is there, arms folded, smiling. Below him it says, Posed exclusively for THEATER MAGAZINE, photo by Harold Stein. He is indeed the little bit of Felix in this photo and post. (He does not appear on the back of the page where there is a similar of June Collyer.) Just a small paid advertisement? An inside joke about the show long forgotten? I wondered that about the dog and baby bear too – did they have some bearing on the show? Or does she always travel with a menagerie? A quick look at the storyline of the 1955 film version doesn’t show any reason for a baby bear. And no, Felix does not seem to have appeared in the show!

Unidentified photo of a young Louise with a parrot, continuing the pet theme.

According to Wikipedia, Louise was on the stage and discovered in her teens. Groody was in ten Broadway shows, four were major hits with hundreds of performances. The same article claims that Hit the Deck was a favorite of hers. She was perhaps best known as Nanette in No, No, Nanette and for her rendition of Tea for Two, although I was unconsciously familiar with her singing Sometimes I’m Happy.

Kinda looks like Louise here. LooLoo was evidently one of her favorite roles.

Louise married a few times. Number two was a shyster who chiseled money out of folks, her included – although she was originally named in the indictment. She divorced him while he was in Sing Sing and moved onto husband number three who seems to have stuck. Groody made a pile of dough in her early years on Broadway, subsequently lost most of it in the crash, but continued to work and lived affluently again by the forties. Louise joined the Red Cross during WWII and has a small discography of early recordings. As far as I can tell, she doesn’t appear to have much of a film career, although I can’t imagine she wasn’t in any films before becoming a fixture on early television.

As for Felix I can only say that he was so ubiquitous in 1928 that even a theater publication was sneaking him in, odd considering that in some ways film was slowly eating into and ultimately eclipsing their business. However, in 1928 no one seems to have been able to resist his charms entirely.

La Jeune France

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Rainy morning here at Deitch Studio in Manhattan. I was warned about the weather, but still managed to be disappointed when I awoke to it this morning. Sometimes rain can make me feel very cosy, but other times it is just a bit discouraging and I’m afraid I am leaning in that direction. It is early March however and here in the Northeast I guess we just have to take what we can get. It is a many cup of coffee morning as I sit here writing you all. As always though, it is a pleasant rabbit hole into the past to spend some time with one of my photos.

I don’t own many, but I do have a real affection for photos that show a store or establishment and its owner/workers and wares, especially magazines, photos (especially photo studios) or in this case postcards. They are little time capsules in a particular way.

This photo came to me via @missmollystlantiques on Instagram. In reality, a while back, she had sold me another photo in front of a photo shop and to my horror somehow sent it to the wrong person – who sadly did not send it back. She refunded me, but I was quite bereft. Then recently she sent me an offer of this photo since it was the same idea and asked if I wanted it, and here we are.

This woman (the proprietress?), stands in the door of a store called Young France. She has a sort of tunic jacket that perhaps is of the kind you might don each day in the store to keep your own dress or blouse clean. I like the bright buckles on her shoes which make me think she was probably a snappy dresser.

A look under a magnifying device reveals some small religious statues (a small Virgin Mary), medals and postcards in the large window. I think many of the postcards are vaguely religious in content too, although the top row are botanical ones. Some also look like the type of photo postcards that leave room for a bit to be written on the front, a small circle of photo at the top. I believe maybe some are photo cards that are fun – I believe I see one of a cat in a hat! There is a display of landscape photos of a souvenir type, on the doorframe next to her, hanging from a string.

My attempt at a detail of the photo.

There is a sort of display drawer under the window. They have locks and I cannot make out what is in them. The bottom of the window display also house some objects and other than a vague outline of a book, I cannot see what those are either however. Perhaps someone else would know immediately from the name and type of items what precisely this store was – souvenir items? In that case the religious items seem odd, but the reverse is also true.

Like many photo postcards, this one was never sent and it has no writing on the back. While the image on this card don’t really quite make the usual Pictorama qualifying parameters, it slips into the collection, filed in my mind under slice of life pictures.