Sepia Saturday #169 - Snapshots of Our Lives

The more I delve into this crazy hobby of mine, collecting old photos, I have come to realize more and more that despite all of our differences we all have so many of the same basic interests; home, family, love, travel, fun, humor, grief and despair to name a few. Since  man has been able to transfer these emotions and memories to some sort of medium, he (or she) has done so in many possible ways.  I myself, have dabbled in a few; scrapbooking  quilting,  collage, and while I have no drawing or painting talent I have for many years been the family photographer and historian.  This week's Sepia Saturday theme centers around this very subject and so I chose a few snapshots from a large box of photos that I purchased some time ago. They appear to have been from the same family from Michigan and Oklahoma and the owner may have been Beulah Miller who appears at different ages in many of the photos. I decided to get a little creative this week and created a collage using some of her family photos. 

Click on collage to enlarge

Although a little hard to see, a couple of the men in these photos are holding camera bags; take a look at the man standing to the left of the airplane and the man on the rocks at the bottom middle. Photography has been an important part of the human experience since the mid 1800's and is now an important part of the day to day life of each of us with the simple use of a cell phone.

For more great images and stories go to Sepia Saturday.

Wedding Wednesday - Another 1890's Couple from Higginsville, MO

This Wednesday I bring you another young newlywed couple photographed in Higginsville, MO in the 1890's by photographer R. Alex Wells who I mentioned in a previous post.  I estimate this handsome, but unidentified couple were wed about 1895.  Not much is known about Wells, he worked as a photographer in Higginsville, in his early twenties.  In the 1910 US Census he was living in Oklahoma City, OK with wife Bertha and son Tracy and listed his parents as being born in Missouri.  He was not found in the 1900 census.  He is also found  in Oklahoma City Directories between 1913 - 1920's with a photography business at  129 1/2 West Main.

Mystery Monday - Three Gentlemen, Unknown Occupation

Can you determine what occupation these gentlemen are representing in this cabinet card from the 1880's?  The man on the left, identified as Curry Williams is wearing what appears to be a painter's overcoat and holding a paint can and paint brush.  The man in the middle who is rather good looking and seems somewhat smug is holding some sort of notebook in his hand.  t his feet is a large bag that could be any number of things.  The young man on the right is holding on to some sort of stick, has his left hand in his pocket and you may notice his pant legs are splotched with what appears to be paint.  From other pictures in my possession I believe he may be Curry's younger brother Albert.

I picked up this Cabinet Card at the same antique show where I got the one I talked about recently (Lillie Allen Draper) along with about fifteen or so others.  I believe many may have been from the same family. You will see that some, once again has written in ink on the front of the card and identified Curry Williams on the left. Since I have the other photographs with family names I was able to locate him on Ancestry.com.  

He was born 15 Mar 1857, Curry Elihu Cadwallader Williams, to Abner and Agatha (Heacock) Williams in Talladega, Alabama.  In the 1880 Oxford, Calhoun, Alabama census, at age 23 he was living with his parents, sister Mollie age 21, brother J. Albert age 19, brother Abner J. age 13, and sister Lillie Belle age 11.  He listed his occupation as warehouse keeper.  He married Cordelia "Della" Anderson on 1 Jan 1889 in Alabama.  I could not identify the photographer - looks likes Hurd & Delany, and I suspect this photo was taken sometime before his marriage.

Curry and his wife Della were the parents of five children.  They moved to Oklahoma City, OK sometime before 1906 were I found numerous Oklahoma City Directory listings of him as "cotton buyer" starting in 1906 and ending in 1927.  He died 2 Feb 1954 in Illinois and is buried in Oklahoma City.

Here's a picture of his younger brother J. Albert Williams (30 Nov 1861 - 23 Mar 1923):