Bancroftiana, Number 117 Fall 2000: Thanks For the Memories: Photograph Albums and Historical Images

Thanks For the Memories: Photograph Albums and Historical Images

Photographic albums have a primary place in the pictorial collection. They come in all shapes and sizes and serve a variety of functions.

Taizo Kato, ca 1920. BANC PIC 1993.028-fALB

Fundamentally, an album is a book consisting primarily of photographs that have been pasted or affixed to its pages. From this simple definition the subject becomes rather more complicated. In Bancroft the term "ALB" serves as a storage or location designator and is found at the end of the item or call number, such as BANC PIC 1993.028-ALB. The designator ALB represents a variety of book-like objects that includes scrapbooks which often contain an abundance of pasted in photographs, newspaper clippings, announcements of official or ceremonial events, letters, momentos, such as strands of hair, and cartes de visit. Photograph albums also include official or company albums filled with photographs, articles, memoranda, contracts, and correspondence documenting a plethora of projects such as the completion of the Hetch Hetchy Dam (from the O'Shaughnessey Papers) or the electrification of the San Francisco Oakland Bay Bridge. One of the most poignant albums in the collection is entitled, "the records of an unbroken friendship but the mortal severance." This album seems to have been assembled after the death of Taizo Kato in 1924. Kato was, with Kanjeiro Sawa, the proprietor of The Korin, a photography, art, and stationery store in Los Angeles. In carefully turning the pages in this album showing family and friends, one gains a sense of Kato's life and his aspirations. The pictures of the store, and the outings on his motorcycle, his proud pose with an impressive looking automobile, all seem to be part of the American dream. What a sharp contrast these pictures are with those of Japanese Americans taken less than 20 years later as they leave for the internment camps.

George A. Applegarth residence. BANC PIC 1977.052–ALB.

How and why does the Pictorial Collection contain such a variety of photographic albums? Photographic albums are transferred from personal papers and institutional records because they require special housing and preservation treatment. Historians, sociologists, cultural anthropologists, and researchers consider photograph albums and pictorial items, in general, as documents and evidence significant in and of themselves. In addition to transfers and donations, albums are also purchased because they add and compliment the overall collections of The Bancroft Library. For example, The Jesse Brown Cook Scrapbooks Documenting San Francisco History and Law Enforcement were purchased at auction in 1996 because they are an invaluable and unique source of San Francisco law enforcement history compiled in thirty-nine albums. This history is seen through the eyes of Jesse Cook who served as a member of the San Francisco Police Department from the 1890s through the 1920s. Of the approximately 12,000 items pasted in the ledger size pages, there are over 6,000 photographs. A full description of the Cook albums is available online, complete with nearly 5,000 digital facsimiles, from the California Heritage Digital Image Database at http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/CalHeritage.

A. Prevost and Emile Janne de Lanare, Boulder Creek, British Columbia, Canada. BANC PIC 1999.052–ALB

Photographic albums form a one of a kind pictorial history time capsule. The many family albums in Bancroft provide a unique and personal historical record. These family albums provide a personal glimpse into the past through the lives of prominent as well as lesser-known families. In the context of the textual records in Bancroft, the accumulation of pictorial evidence adds a depth and a richness to the portrait of life in the West from the end of the 19th century, when the portable camera first became available to the amateur snap shooter, through to the ubiquitous disposable or single-use camera of the last decades of the 20th Century. Looking through a small sample from our collection of family albums one is struck by the variety of images. The similarity in intent and emotional content between the rich and famous and the less celebrated members of society is clear. There is a common need to document and commemorate family events, voyages, births, marriages, and deaths, to hold fast and remember.

Walter Haas, Jr. at Oakland A's baseball game. BANC PIC 1992.078–ALB

Katherine Applegarth compiled an album as a tribute to her grandfather, the noted architect George Adrian Applegarth, who designed a number of celebrated San Francisco landmark buildings. The album consists of an essay, entitled "Reflections On My Grandfather," and over thirty good quality photographs of Applegarth's most significant buildings, including the California Palace of the Legion of Honor, Clift Hotel, and the Spreckels Residence. The typed essay and the neatly labeled and captioned photographs almost belie the very personal nature of this memorial album, clearly assembled with care and written with pride and affection. The album combines the personal anecdote, the story told and retold at family gatherings, with a valuable record of "Gappy's" wonderful architectural legacy-a legacy that in some cases only remains in photographs.

The Elise Stern Haas Family Photograph Collection includes twenty-nine albums compiled primarily by Elise Stern Haas throughout her lifetime. The majority of the albums focus on Elise Stern Haas and her husband Walter A. Haas. What is quite wonderful about these albums is the personal portrayal of a socially prominent San Francisco family. Some of the albums contain formal portraits made by renowed photographers such as Arnold Genthe, Dorothea Lange, Edward Weston, and Johan Hagemeyer, showing us how Elise Haas and her family wished to be seen. The informal photographs-the snapshots -show us how they lived, the family outings, social activities, and leisurely pursuits. Volume Nine was compiled on the occasion of Walter and Elise Haas's 25th wedding anniversary. It depicts with humor and affection the European and Scandinavian celebration cruise the Haas's took, accompanied by their children.

On the occasion of Walter Haas's 25th wedding anniversary aboard the cruise ship Polaris. BANC PIC 1992.078–ALB

Mining in the West is one of the areas that is well documented in a rich variety of formats-everything from sketches, letters, paintings, and stock certificates, to the Marshall gold nugget-in the collections of the Bancroft. Photographs, including those made by Carleton Watkins for George Hearst Mining Building, are a prominent part of this documentation. The album of mining photographs of Boulder Creek and the Atlin, British Columbia mining district fits into the overall scope of the Bancroft. This particular album is a souvenir of A. Prevost's year long stay in Atlin as an accountant for the Societe Miniaere de la Colombie Britannique, in 1902. Many of the pages are captioned with handwritten French text. Prevost appears in several of the photographs along with the managers of the mining operation. One of the more interesting photographs shows Prevost and Emile Janne de Lamare, identified as the agent of the company, in front of a cabin at Boulder Creek. Prevost, in a suit coat and tie is seated, his boots resting on a table, the barrel of a rifle resting against his legs. His companion, de Lamare stands next to him, a revolver tucked into his belt, and the tools of their trade -a shovel, a pick, a pan with nuggets, a surveyor's transit, a scale - strategically placed for the photograph. Clearly, this photograph is a set piece, the same scene is depicted - with a different arrangement of the accoutrements-on the opposite page. In it's theatrical portrayal of the rugged miner of the West, this photograph was perhaps meant to impress the folks back home. Browse through some selections illustrated here and remember to treasure your family photographs, to annotate them as to who, what, where, and when, and to consider adding them to the collection of The Bancroft Library.

—Jack von Euw
Curator, Pictorial Collection