The Finest in Vintage Photography Since 2005
A small selection of Ferrotype mini-postcards (they measure 3.5″ x 2 .5″ each) taken by a farming family circa 1910. The Ferrotype process used a single chemical solution to develop the photos but the lack of separate toner and fixer is very evident as almost all of the ferrotypes I’ve seen have faded badly. Of course weirdos like me like stuff like this so here’s 25 of them for your viewing pleasure.
For those of you who don’t know, besides photographs I also collect vintage amateur recordings- mostly Voice-O-Graphs (the coin-op booth where you could record your own record for a quarter) but other home recording devices as well. I’ve started digitizing them and have posted a bunch to SoundCloud (link) if you have any interest in listening. Beware- I do have a fetish for very damaged vinyl!
A small selection of photos from a series of negatives and contact prints taken by some young Chicagoans in the late 30s/early 40s. Click here to see them all.
A small, strange set of hand-tinted photos documenting a duck hunt. Click here to see them all.
A few photos taken by a Chicago cabby in the 70s including several great portraits of his fellow drivers. Click here to them all.
In honor of National Poetry Month (and the possibility that we might actually be able to travel this summer) I bring you the travel diary of a young man who took a road trip from Ohio down to the Grand Canyon and then up through California to the Pacific Northwest in the summer of 1928. While there is a fair amount of description, the poetry comes from the long lists of place names he provides- this was pre-interstate so making your way across the country usually meant driving straight through towns rather than bypassing them on via a highway. This will probably be tl:dr for most but for the few who might enjoy such a thing I’ve scanned it in it’s entirety. Click here to see it all!
