old photo

Hot Popcorn

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: It’s a crisp fall weekend here in New York City. Tomorrow will, in part, be devoted to a Halloween Howl dog parade over at Carl Schurz park. I will stop by the animal hospital’s table and visit my colleagues handing out animal care info. Costumed cuties will likely abound so keep a weather eye out for pics on Instagram.

Meanwhile, today’s photo is one of those odd one off purchases for me. Saw it, liked it and followed my nose to purchasing it. I can imagine this being a much loved family photo of this proud family business owner of yore.

It came to me via the Midwest (dealer of all things vintage @missmollystlantiques), but there are no identifiers as to location. Emanelo Fine Cigars are boasted and Camels proudly in large letters below it. The sign that reads Pharmacy is decidedly less prominent, at least for the purposes of this photo.

Clearly the pharmacy was also where you went for your cigars and cigarettes and there is a sign for something called Penetro, which a quick bit of research tells me was a medicated rub. Sort of like Vicks I assume. (That from my childhood – does it still exist? I haven’t heard of anyone using it for years.) There is a tiny advertisement for Kodak also on the far left.

Our fellow, I assume proprietor, stands proudly in front of the establishment and with this splendid popcorn machine which is labeled Hot Popcorn. This is not a photo postcard, but a photo and it shows evidence of having been glued into an album at one point. The Deco border dates it back to the early years of the 20th century, but for decade it is a bit timeless and hard to nail down.

Pictorama readers know that I have restaurants on one side of my family tree and a dry goods store on the other. I would love to have a photo like this of either establishment, but in some ways especially Butler Dry Goods which I retain a very dim memory of having been in. It is more a memory of light and smell and space than of the specifics of the interior.

I inherited a large number of photos which I am going through in New Jersey. I don’t know where they all were because there are many I never saw before. Of course now with mom gone I have largely lost my ability to have the family members identified.

Many of these photos are from my dad’s family and I’m not sure how many she would have known as these were long before her time too. Dad never knew. He seemed to remain somewhat willfully ignorant about his family history and passed almost no stories on. Mom held what tales we had, as told to her by Dad’s mother. I have a few cousins who might find them of interest and I should scan some for them. I imagine I will share the best of the pictures with you all too as future posts.

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.

Miss Betty Balfour and Felix

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: Returning to our rollicking Felix roots today with this odd page which was sold on its own via eBay. I was the only one interested in it and I actually really love it. The overall page has a fair amount of interest – the Gertrude Hoffman Girls dancing in the open air appeared naked at first glance with their brief, thin costumes. That certainly would have been unusual on July 30, 1924, the date on this sheet. Closer inspection shows sort of cotton playsuits.

Found this issue which I assume is the one before mine, July 16, 1924. Looks like fun!

The First “Movie” Garden Party is the heading on this extracted page. It appears to have come out of something called The Sketch magazine. The Sketch had an extremely long life it turns out, running from 1893-1958; it was an illustrated British weekly journal. It is most notable perhaps for having launched the George Studdy Bonzo illustrations in 1921.

Close up on the Gertrude Hoffman Girls dancing.

At the bottom of the page it boasts, The Silent Stage Festivities: at the Royal Botanical Gardens. Below it, The first Cinematograph Garden Party, held at the Royal Botanical Gardens, the original home of the Theatrical Garden Party, was a big success. Scores of well-known screen starts gathered at the festivity, and the sideshows and entertainments were really amusing. Our snapshots show some of the many famous folk who were present, and include the Hoffman Girls’ dancing performance in the open-air arena.

Miss Peggy Ryland has left no tracks online.

This page has four features, upper left, Miss Peggy Ryland – I am on the fence about whether Peggy, close up above, is a man in drag or not, Kim says no. The almost naked dancers are next over and below them, Miss Chrissie White has a soft drink. Unlike Peggy Ryland who has left no tracks, Chrissie White made 180 movies between 1908 and 1933 and was quite a star. Given this I assume I have at least seen her in passing, but don’t recognize her in the least – nor does Kim. I assume she is with her husband here, Henry Edwards, occasionally her co-star and director. They were evidently a famous couple seen about town at the time. She retired from film early but lived until 1989 and the ripe old age of 94. I am enjoying her outfit shown here – period perfect.

Chrissie White

Speaking of perfection! Now onto the main event – ohhhhh how I wish I could have attended this! Felix-es galore in all sizes, on their costumes, a sign above them sporting him. Here Miss Betty Balfour holds court. Betty I know from her work in the Jessie Matthews film, Evergreen although she is even better known for her turn in an early silent Hitchcock comedy called Champagne. (Kim has seen it and I do not think I have.)

Be still my heart!

Betty’s got her hand on one lovely huge Felix which comes up to her waist, but so many others lurk around. I love how they fall out of the confines of the photo and into the margins. A small one hangs off the sign at the top and one of the minions is holding a sizable one. A close look at Betty’s basket says flowers – I was thinking a Felix might be tucked in there too. Of course if it were me I would want to be in one of the Felix decorated costumes – with a grinning maybe winking Felix embroidered onto my chest! Oh to find one or even this original photo!

Signed postcard for sale on eBay at the time of publication.

That’s it folks, the back of the sheet is devoted to lawn-tennis notes I am sorry to say. Completely lost on me I am afraid. Nonetheless, I will treasure this particular sheet for its Felix fun and preserve it in the Pictorama archive for posterity.

Speedy

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: At first I wondered, as you may be right now, why this card ended up in my feed, until I realized that the woman perched on the back of this motorcycle is holding a tiny kitten in her lap. He or she, a cute little tabby, is snuggled in on the lap of that nice white dress. Although it may not seem so at first, it is indeed a cat photo.

After a bit of consideration, I realized that this seems to be a celebratory photo. Perhaps it was the purchase of this nice new Indian motorcycle, shiny chrome on the handlebars. (Am I wrong in saying it does not yet have its front light?) The fellow is in a suit and tie with a straw hat, perky but not really motorcycle riding ready. The woman, in her white dress, sporting a pretty locket and kitten perched on the back, is the real point of this though. Her feet off the ground, she is jaunty! Her black stockings and shoes – we can just about see them swinging around the kickstand. They are both grinning. Or could they have just gotten hitched?

This is a photo postcard and like so many, it was never sent, but instead kept in mostly pristine condition.

For all of their jollity, the landscape where they are posed is a bit bereft of charm. There is some sort of industrial tower in the background with a few low wooden buildings and trees off in the distance. Closer in is what appears to be a whet stone on a foot activated stand, some indistinct farm equipment near it, further obscured by what appears to be a thumb print in the chemicals used to print this. On the other side there appears to be a chicken or maybe a goose in the background and a field planted with rows of something.

Somewhere there exists (or did) an early snippet of home movies of my mother’s mom and dad, newlyweds, on an early motorcycle. I think they were either on their honeymoon or it was their honeymoon although I have trouble imagining that they rode that motorcycle from New Jersey to St. Louis where his family lived, which is what I believe they did shortly after being married. (I must try to find someone who knows that story.) Anyway, that would have been a couple of decades after this, although not all that many. My grandfather was an engineer and all things mechanical and in motion were his thing. He repaired outboard motors for extra cash, but just seemed to always be tinkering successfully with things. Frank Wheeling, he died young but I do have adoring memories of him from when I was a tiny tot. My guess is he would have liked this motorcycle. (To find a post about my dad as a young man on his jalopy of a bike go here.)

I myself have only been on a motorcycle a few times as a passenger and I did find it sort of thrilling. This motorcycle seems almost closer to the electric bikes we see today. Kim and I have eyed them with a bit of interest, but I am not sure I see a way that we will end up getting to enjoy one unless someone offers us a ride – I don’t think either of us really has any business trying to drive one solo. But I confess, they are tempting and I although I am ambivalent about driving a car these and various scooters (a neighbor in the city has a pink Vespa!) do appeal.

B. C. Gregory Elementary School, 1922

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: This item came my way via a rather splendid if small used bookstore in San Diego called Blustocking Books. I was just about to check out when this photo caught my eye. I added it to the purchase pile having given it only a passing look.

Since my discovery of a clutch of yard long photos I am keeping a collector’s weather eye out for group photos like this and especially from the early decades of the 20th Century. I have a theoretical parameter of beach related or New Jersey related images, however rules are made to be broken, right? However, when I went to look for B.C. Gregory elementary school you can imagine my surprise that the first and most persistent results are for my mother’s hometown here in New Jersey, Long Branch. I can’t help but wonder if I went all the way to California to find a photograph of a local Jersey grade school. perhaps even one that my mother went to, although this one well before her grade school days.

The landscape gives us no definitive clues, the long fir tree and scant foliage could belong to either coast. The children’s clothes provide no indication either.

Youngest children in front and the oldest in the back looking a bit older than the sort of eighth grade or so that elementary schools generally age out at. While not in uniform, the have clearly been requested to dress within some guidelines with their white shirts, mostly dark ties on the fellows, a smattering of suits. The girls are largely in white blouses, but right in the center are two girls in plaid dresses, on atop of the other.

Detail of the kids in back holding up the school sign.

As is always the case and especially with a longer exposure in the day, there are a few blurred heads of those who could not sit still. The banner with the year is front and center by some of our youngest participants and the school name is on a banner at the back held up two young gentleman who do not look like they enjoy their assignment.

While we are all familiar with school photos of this kind it is interesting that this was such a small school – the entire elementary school is shown here and in my day would have maybe been a single grade. I am wondering if in this very house I have some of my dutiful class photos. I know I have several years of grammar school somewhere. (Those did not turn up before posting sadly, another day to see me in my grade school days.)

Perhaps it is the longish exposure (or just school!), but this is not a group where many are attempting to smile. The third row from the front is the most smiling I see. It has that charmed moment in time quality. Those in front anticipating moving up the steps further each year, those at the top ready to move on to high school and beyond.

Hello Dearie

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Pam’s Pictorama Post: I am running late today for this post, my second from New Jersey this summer. The neglected garden needed my attention while it was still cool enough to work out here. It was a small start, but I am also tired from my first week as a commuter and getting over a bad head cold last weekend. However, it should also be noted that today is the first day of six since we got here where it has not been a torrential downpour either. Let the garden enjoyment (and work) begin!

Nevertheless, I have this little treasure which arrived at Deitch Studio shortly before our departure last weekend. While the aged quality of this photo makes it less than perfect, it was an irresistible image to add to the Pictorama collection.

Recent acquisition and post as below.

The concept of the perfect Felix costume has long stoked my imagination and I believe informed Kim’s Alias the Cat. (That book – one of the best ever! – for purchase can be found here.) While I search to acquire the perfect mask photos of Felix costumes can also satisfy. I just posted about another and it is unusual because I don’t really have that many in my collection. (A post about that recent acquisition, shown above, can be found here.)

Opening of Kim’s Alias the Cat.

Early in my collecting I found an interesting clutch of early photos of folks donning Felix costumes. Tiny snapshots of people in masks or full costume. Oddly, I didn’t acquire them together either which is sort of fascinating. That post from the early days of Pictorama can be found here.

Today’s photo is a tintype and as to be expected that means the writing on Felix’s chest is reversed. Hard to know if Felix was an adult with these two small bunny attired kids. More likely an older child. While it is definitely an off-model mask it was commercially made, as were the bunny outfits the other children sport.

One from a series of photos from the post mentioned above.

I have no explanation for the staff or cane held, but the older of the two rabbit kids. If I had to guess (and it would be a guess) I would say the older of those two is a girl. I have no idea at all about the younger. They are outside and a careful look shows a woman behind them and some buildings, or more likely pictures of buildings, behind her. There are other indistinct people and things, however the picture grows wavy there and they are unreadable.

I was surprised to be reminded that this photo actually came from Louisiana, not Great Britain. The holder strikes me as oh so British and of course it’s most recent home before mine was not necessarily its place of origin. I believe that virtually all of the Felix tintypes I have of this sort have come from either England or Australia. Having said that, most of them are people posing with large Felix dolls and this is just kids in costume.

Wall decor at Deitch Studio.

I have yet to decide how the Pictorma library will stretch in the Jersey digs and have yet to start to hang things, although some of the yard long photos are on display. I mostly leave the items here that have ended up here, but I hope for the leisure to make some determinations about decoration. More to come when I figure that out. For now it has gotten too hot for the garden and there are numerous cats requesting pets.

Felix Front and Center

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: So what the heck is going on in this photo? To start, I am mad for this Felix costume which is sort of exactly what Pam Butler is looking for in a Felix costume. A wonderful full head be-wiskered mask (with hard, perky pointy ears) and then a simple black “cat suit” to complement it – not the covered paws however.

This isn’t a photo postcard, it is a slightly larger (4″x6″) studio photo. What the heck are they dressed up for? If it weren’t for the crown (a rather splendid one) on the girl on our right, the fact that they are in costume might have eluded me. Was it a play? But then why Felix? I am a bit sorry the origin is lost to us, but I am very pleased to have this unusual photo join the Pictorama collection.

In addition to being a rather posh studio photo these children look well-heeled. There is a nice symmetry to the picture with the long-waisted dress between the two notched in at the middle. Headscarf on the middle and tallest of them. Behind them a bland sort of backdrop which must have made do for all photos, faux scenes of fake landscapes outside drawn and painted windows.

Embossed at the bottom is the legend Service Studios and something I cannot read below – Olesbrough is what is visible. On the back it says, Service Studio, Middlesbrough (Felix the Cat – 1920’s.) Perhaps one of Pictorama’s British readers can help sort the location question out.

All of the Felix photos in my collection are essentially one-of-a-kind although occasionally I have found and purchased several from a session and I do occasionally find my photos elsewhere online. Of course in theory there could be some multiples of any of them, at least from those which were printed from a negative. Meanwhile, the other day while we were in San Diego and I had a few minutes to see what was up on Instagram, I saw a photo of a little girl on a beach with Felix which looked familiar. Turns out it was some sold listings on a sellers feed – and I had purchased it from her!

Black Cat Couture

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Many of us have a period in the past and it is certainly no secret that my affinity is for the 1920’s and early ’30’s. Let’s face it, this was a very Felix-y time. However, it was a time a very black cat time in general – reaching a bit earlier to the ‘teens.

I have previously opined with some lust over items like the Halloween decor of the earliest part of the 20th century. (Some posts boasting extremely jolly Dennison’s Halloween decorating books from the teens can be found here.) The dress being sported in the back row of this photo does make me yearn for a time when lucky black cats decorated both items and clothing. Interesting that this is not at all a costume, not festive Halloween wear, just an otherwise white summer dress.

My own version of black cat clothing from a post last fall. Pams-Pictorama.com Collection.

Obviously this photo came to my attention due to the fashion statement of the woman with the large black scaredy cat on her dress. Pictorama applauds her attire and I am so glad it is memorialized here. The seller on eBay states that this is the 1920’s and also that it was from Newark, New Jersey. That these are fellow Jersey Girls makes me like it even more.

It is a small photo, not a postcard. It is a petit 3″x 4.5″ and the rounded edges is a slightly unusual printing style. On the back it is stamped 516 LxL Newark, NJ and something that didn’t come out. Sadly no identifiers or date.

Not clothing, but an arresting cat pillow image here from a post last September. Pams-Pictorama.com Collection.

Nine women are gathered in this grouping. It’s hard to say from hairstyles and clothing if the seller is right about the date or if this might creep into the early 30’s. The back row of younger women all wear white while the front row, seated on benches in front the women look a bit older and are wearing floral prints and a bit more dressed up.

My friend with the black cat dress has had the good sense to stand apart a bit so we get pretty much the full effect, while the three woman at the end are sort of grouped naturally together. In the front two women sit with their heads together – makes you wonder about the relationships represented here.

Took this photo of a friend’s daughter’s shoes last summer. Were beloved hand me downs from another friend. Who wouldn’t love these?

This appears to be a nice backyard on a spring or summer day – too hot for using the fire pit and wood right in front of the scene and a large garage with double doors (just like my NJ grandmother had) behind them. To my knowledge, Newark and the immediately surrounding area were more residential at this time than the very urban way we think of it now. The amateur photographer has the top row of women butting up against the outside of the frame, but this way we do see a bit more of the yard. I’ve improved it a tiny bit, but it is also overexposed.

Part of me wonders how the black cat dress was received – it certainly is the most sporty bit of attire here. Were the back row of women following some general mandate to wear white and did this qualify? Perhaps ironic that it has saved this photo from complete obscurity and earned it a perch here at Pictorama.

Goodbye to Earth

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Today’s card wandered in via eBay. It belongs to a series of such images made by various studios and photographers contemporaneously including a favorite I own and blogged about previously here and here. What is it about kittens drifting along in the sky that proves so irresistible? This pair looks remarkably unconcerned about their voyage.

This rather identical pair sit in a small basket which is almost entirely obscured by the darkness at the bottom of the photo. I can’t imagine they packed many provisions for a trip all the way to the moon. Such small fellows, can’t expect them to plan well I guess. It is a benign looking (paper?) moon they are heading toward, smiling kindly, so I am sure it will be fine.

Is it a coincidence that these kittens look pretty much identical to today’s pusses? Pams-Pictorama.com Collection.

A close look reveals that the “balloon” is actually a small ball (label almost visible on the right) covered in a small fish next and with a string on top to produce the clever effect of a floating balloon. At the bottom it says Goodbye to Earth and the maker, Rotary Photo, E.C. is noted. On the left it is blurry where the photo was laid down to be reshot for the card but it says something A.

I have probably written about Rotary which back in its day was a bonanza producer of such cards and one could devote oneself to a collection made up solely of cute cat cards produced by these folks – I don’t seem to have ended up owning many however. I sometimes imagine a studio with kittens in various stages of growth bounding around. I don’t want to know what happed to the grown kitties – bet there was nary a mouse around there though!

On the back of this card it notes that it was Printed in England. It was never mailed. In the ten years I have been producing Pictorama posts (yep, we are hard on an actual 10 year anniversary as it believe it was July of ’14 – yay Pictorama!) I think this is the first time I have encountered an item that seemed to have a message for me. For whatever reason I had not read it before purchasing the card.

The German version I posted about back in 2014. Link above for post. Pams-Pictorama.com Collection.

Some folks know that I have been in the midst of some ongoing, and at times extremely painful, oral surgery. Among other things it has kept me from running and in general has pretty much made me remarkably miserable. However, as we head into this summer holiday week I especially enjoyed the message in a neat script penned on the back – no note who it is to or from – This so all our cares for a week or so more, and our return will be much like a fall would be to the “pussies”. A safe July 4 week landing to all!

Spare Felix?

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Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: Portland, Oregon! Although the seller of today’s find was in California, this photo obviously appears to hail from Portland originally. Rogue homemade Felix seems to have proliferated in Portland back in the day and I would love to know why that city seems to have had a special relationship with him.

It’s been quite a while since I have purchased a Pacific Northwest Felix, but I had a spate of them early in my collecting career which gave me the idea that they had a specific yen for him. Parade floats and costumes – there’s was homegrown Felix fun in that part of the country and I am sorry to have missed it. (These location specific Felixes form a sub-genre of my collection. Posts for these pics can be found here, here, here, here and here!)

One of a clutch of photos of the same batch from an early post. Pams-Pictorama.com Collection.

This natty fellow and his slightly off-model Felix-y wheel cover fits well in the group. While Felix looks slightly more like his identical cousin than himself, it is a pretty good likeness. the gentleman posing is so clearly pleased to show this off I’d say. Bow tie, vest and jacket, he’s dressed and posing for the photo.

An early Portland parade post. Pams-Pictorama.com collection.

It’s a small photo. Only a little more than 3″ x 2″. Like the other photos I have mentioned above, there isn’t a lot of information in the image. There is a nice cottage in view behind him, trees and telephone poles. There’s no back license plate which might have supplied a year, and nothing is written on the back. However, Oregon (and our assumed place of origin) is supplied over Felix.

Another Portland parade post (although a not Felix), pic from 1909. Pams-Pictorama.com collection.

I do not own a car and don’t really drive, although I assume with the house in Jersey this is something I will need to fix over time. Oh to be able to do it in style like this however.