Select from Images Below
This set features some recent acquisitions of the Charlie Coulter donation. He purchased the glass plate negatives at an auction in Walker Co., GA in the mid-1960s. Remarkably, many of the people in that set are also seen in the larger set acquired from a Lookout Mountain estate sale via eBay.
It is reasonable to assume that the photographers knew each other and possibly worked together at D. B. Loveman’s Department Store in Chattanooga. As you’ll see below - yet another connection to that workplace has recently become clear.
Photos are the reflections of people’s everyday lives. Their place of employment is not only where they spend most of their time - but also where friendships are made.
Before movie theaters, radio, television, and all that followed; families gathered in the parlor for fun and relaxation. And at the epicenter of the parlor was the piano. Private, domestic music making was centric in most homes, with aspirations to high art.
A poster on the wall promotes the novel "The Fall of the Curtain". The book by Harold Begbie was originally released in 1901.
Even 123 years ago - our smart photographer knew it was easier to remember what was received as wedding gifts if you took a picture of them. In this case, a co-worker, William Norval Taggart had just married Tullulah Virginia Coffey. See how I determined this info in the video below.
A set of wedding gifts from 1899.
A beautifully composed portrait of a young woman in her element. She is surrounded by stylish furniture and bric-a-brac. The book on the desk represents a variation of a popular prop for women in portraits at the time.
The disparity in satisfaction of quality of life is apparent and fascinating. At one extreme on the far left, a beautiful young woman is looking quite confident and well put together - to the far right, a woman whose face seems to tell a story of a desperately hard life. Not to mention the unfortunate 'Dudley Moore in a dress' woman in the center.
If Facebook were around in the early 1900's - this would be a shared post of adorability.
