1880s Favorites
I’m still staying inside out of the heat, cataloging my antique photos. I’ve been working in the 1880s, and here are a few of my favorites.
This is one of my all-time favorites. When I look at it, I see Meg, Amy, Jo, and Beth from Little Women.
The 1880s were the decade of buttons and bustles.
When you look closely, you can see that the area around her mid-section has been re-touched. It looks to me as if the photographer even redrew the buttons to match up with her new waistline.
That is not wickerwork behind her, that is some judicious retouching.
In Dressed for the Photographer, Joan L. Severa gives a description that seems to match this picture, “The bustle size reached its climax in 1886, as the short corset also returned; thus, the fashionable body was confined sharply through the rib cage and released just about the natural waistline into a nearly horizontal deep bustle in the back and fuller hips at the sides…” (p. 378)
I can imagine that when this lady handed her cabinet cards out to her friends, none of them had the courage to say to her, “Why, Minerva, how is it that you looked so much smaller around the waist then than you do now?” She would give them that look, daring them to say anything, and they just would have swallowed their words.
I have a lot of family photographs, but the one below is one of the few that I can date with certainty. This is a wedding photo of some very distant relatives — the man is 26 and has just arrived from the Netherlands, and the girl (also born in the Netherlands) is 16! Family records say the year is 1881.
Teunis Stob, 26, and Janna Lurtesma, 16, in 1881.
I have created a database to help keep track of all the features of both photo and fashion styles to help me come up with dates. In case you are thinking of doing something similar, here is a sample page.
A page of my photo database.
I was going to try to sort them by date first and then catalog them, but with the database (in Microsoft Access) I am able to input them randomly and then filter by whatever feature I want. I really like being able to put the image on the form.
I have also purchased the book 19th Century Card Photos Kwik-guide. It doesn’t have the detailed fashion information I was hoping for, but it is very helpful with figuring out dates from card characteristics just as borders, photography studio imprints, and so on. If only all these photographers had read the book, and mounted all their photographs according to trends, this project would be easier!
Amazing photos, Janna looks lovely I think. Imagine dealing with all that clothing, ARGH
I used to work in a historical park, and wearing all the petticoats wasn’t bad at all, even here in Texas. But we didn’t have to wear all those tight corsets, thank goodness!
This is another lovely post – I chuckled at the thought of that lady with her waistline that has been retouched! That must have been such a tricky thing to do with photos before the days of Photoshop. Also very poignant that young couple just arrived from the Netherlands – think of their hopes and dreams. I’ve just read Willa Cather’s My Antonia so my mind is much on the courage and tribulations of those settler families.
Yes, I am really proud of my ancestors and what they went through for a better life. I know it was hard to make a change, but then they were all used to hard lives in their original countries, or they would have stayed where they were. Most all of them came over in big family groups and I think that must have helped them adapt. I have been to Rotterdam and seen the Holland America ticket office that at least some of them went through, and that was very special to me.
And I love Willa Cather! I need to reread My Antonia. Ooh! I should do a post matching up these cabinet card ladies with what they might have been reading, etc.! See what a good idea you gave me!
Poor “Minerva”–her natural figure didn’t lend itself to that style! But then mine doesn’t lend itself to today’s styles so much either! I love that you’re using the database to really keep track of the details–it will be so useful!
Yes, I’m sure she wouldn’t thank me for pointing out, even after all these years!
The thing I am liking best about the database is that it makes me notice all kinds of details I wouldn’t see otherwise – trims and jewelry shapes and so on. I bet it’s the same for you when you go to write up your vintage textiles, you notice lots of new things about them.
Did you find Teunis Stob’s picture in “The Book”? There may be a couple more in there but they’d be hard to reproduce since they’re just on paper. Love all the pictures. For fashion of the 1960’s you could use the picture of me in the yellow dress I made and wore and wore and wore, with my black wig. I would not allow you to put my name with it tho.
Yes, and out of all the family pictures I have (mostly Aunt Kate’s family), that is the only one that was reproduced in “The Book.” That is how I know its date for sure.
Sorry, you and your yellow dress are out. For me, true fashion stopped after the 1950s. I love voluminous New Look and “I Love Lucy” fashions, cannot stand those 60s skinny tube clothes and “Laura Petrie” fashions and afterwards. It is one of the tragedies of my life that I only had 2 “princess” dresses and then fashion went to those Twiggy styles. 😦 And don’t get me started on polyester. Sigh. I know you feel for me.
What a good idea to create a database of one’s photo collection. I’ve been trying to attach family photos to my family tree, but I need to get more systematic about it. And those 4 girls – are they sisters? Two look alike to me (far left and right) but the other two don’t seem as similar in looks. I wonder if the one’s curly hair was her curse or her pride. Females do seem to have spent a lot of grooming time curling their hair over the centuries.
I’ve always thought those 4 girls must be sisters, but that is one of the photos I have bought over the years, not one from my family, so I don’t know. That one in the back with the curly hair looks like she knows she overdid it with the curling iron, if you ask me.
Great post…love the idea of the database which will prove to be invaluable. Glad you had The Book to help provide a dateline. I have several of my Mom’s old old photos; unfortunately no dates. So that shall be my job here shortly to find and identify these photos.
I am having a harder time figuring out dates than I thought I would, but I am still getting a lot out of it, because I am noticing so many more details by going through them carefully! I look forward to seeing what turns up in your photos.