Saturday, April 28, 2012

Sepia Saturday #123 - The Doll's Maypole Dance

When I saw the theme announced for this week's Sepia Saturday, "May Day Around the May Pole" I knew I had the perfect photo.  When I picked up this stereograph some time ago in an antique store I had no idea what I would ever do with it and voila!  the perfect opportunity just arose.



This photo was published by Webster & Albee, Publishers, Rochester, NY and according to O. Henry Mace, Collecter's Guide to Early Photographs (2nd Edition) 1999 this particular stereograph is probably quite worthless.  A stereograph is a "pair of photographs, usually taken with a binocular camera, mounted for three-dimensional viewing in a stereoscope."  The concept was conceived by Charles Wheatstone, a British physicist, and introduced in 1851, the peak years being 1858 - 1905 and literally "thousands of theme series were produced."  In this particular case the subject is quite ordinary and the corners are damaged so the photo is of no value, except of course for this week's Sepia Saturday!


16 comments:

  1. How wonderful. Titania has also a stereoscopic treatment of May Day : which makes your posts stereoscopic.

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  2. I thought those were little girls until I enlarged the photo. They're actually dressed up dolls. What a surprise.
    Nancy

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  3. That is a wonderful image, and has to be the first dolly maypole picture on Sepia Saturday! We can just imagine the delight felt by some little girl on viewing this on the stereoscope. I bet her mother was smiling too.

    By the way Teresa, sorry if I’ve mentioned it before, but are you aware that you still have word verification switched on. Most of us have got rid of it as it is proving exasperating. After one or two spam emails it settled down and now I don’t have any.

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  4. I am just fascinated all over again every time I look at all these lovely May Day celebrations....great old look at the day! Thanks!

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  5. I think steregraphs are so interesting -- reminds me of a forerunner of the old ViewMaster that I enjoyed so much as a kid. I'm glad you were able to snag this one -- what a find!

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  6. Teresa, I think the stereograph with the dressed up dolls quite charming. One wonders who had this idea? Lucky you to have picked it up!

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  7. An interesting picture. I've not really come across anything stereoscopic before - I find the dolls a little sinister looking though.

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  8. That is beautiful! It gave me an idea of setting up scenes with toys. How neat that you have it, valuable or not it sure is spot on for this week's theme and I enjoyed seeing it very much.

    Kathy M.

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  9. Two stereographs this week is a treat for us. Would not have realised they were dolls if you had not told us.

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  10. I think that is a fun collectible even though it isn't worth much money.

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  11. Two stereoscopes this week. This one is just precious!

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  12. Perfect, indeed!!
    That's a great find!!
    (Even if worthless according to some...)
    :)~
    HUGZ

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  13. I wondered how they found all the little girls with such masses of curly hair until I looked more closely. Lovely images.

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  14. I'm glad I'm catching up here. I adore this. What a terrific find. I bet this has great value for doll collectors who can ID these antique lovelies.

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  15. A very appropriate image. I can almost see the photographer's daughter helping to arrange the tableau.

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  16. This view would certainly have been made to entertain little girls, right? Do you suppose this was one of a series? What a lot of work to arrange the dolls in the setting.

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