Color photos from the depression

[John Raabe]

Color Photography was invented way back in the mid 1800's, but color film for affordable cameras wasn't readily available until the late 1930's - so there aren't many color photos from before that time. So the rare color photos taken by the US Farm Security Administration and Office of War Information during the 1930's depression are pretty interesting.

These were taken when there were few phones, no TV, no computers, no video games, no air conditioning, and most people made a living doing hard work.

The image above is a log "dugout" home in New Mexico

Check them out at http://extras.denverpost.com/archive/captured.html

Makes you think about how much life has changed in just a few years. (Thanks to Bill Myers - www.bmyers.com)

[ScottA]

Nice find John. 

[OkieJohn2]

Great find John, and for anyone who wants even more, check out this link:
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/search/?st=grid&c=100&co=fsac

[John_M]

it is really amazing how much difference a color photo can give you a feeling of what life was like back then!  Those were cool to look at!

[glenn kangiser]

That appears to be a low sloped sod roof.  I wonder what they used for a membrane back then?

Cool, John.  Thx.

[rick91351]

That appears to be a low sloped sod roof.  I wonder what they used for a membrane back then?

Cool, John.  Thx.

Tar paper and canvas?  Those soddies did not last all that long in most places yet in others are still around if taken care of.  Hope we do not have to find out but it certainly good to be aware of what can and could be done if one choose to be a survivor.

[glenn kangiser]

Looking more at that photo it appears there was a mill in the area - the addition  is using slabs (caps ) from the sides of the logs. 

I had trouble loading the link at first but when I did get in I also saw the slabbed insides of the boards. 

I was thinking how much it looked like here. [idea]

[John_M]

I wonder if they contemplated tar paper or tyvek behind that log siding?

[NM_Shooter]

Amazing pictures.  I was struck by the fact that this was only 70 years ago for many of those pictures. 

Not a lot of happy faces.  Those were the people who built America.  God bless them.

I wonder how old the worker in the carbon black factory was at the time of the pictures.

-f-

[John Raabe]

For an even earlier look at color photography here is another link... This from the early 1900's in Russia (pre-Revolution). The photographer needed a railroad car for his equipment!

http://blogs.denverpost.com/captured/2009/10/21/color-photography-from-russian-in-the-early-1900s/?source=ARK_plog



(See picture #33 - I'll bet Tolstoy could have written a novel about this fellow!)

[phalynx]

I guess graffiti was common back then.  Really good pictures though.

[rick91351]

I was thinking how much it looked like here. [idea]

Believe me Glenn you did come to mind.....   

[glenn kangiser]

[glenn kangiser]

OK Rick, here is the one that made me think of here - in the dugout above....



Going a bit farther...

My family (uncles and cousins - we went to Oregon to homestead)  settled in Brockton, Mass. and many still live there

One of the pix was a street in Brockton.. I went there in 1989 and it looks the same...



Matter of fact .. here is my great uncle standing on the steps of a Brockton house...



My Great great grandfather lived with them there and is buried in Brockton.  My GG Grandmother, Elizabeth,  passed on and he was left alone.

He was old, senile and very frail.  

He would wander around the streets of Brockton calling out "Elizabeth, Elizabeth...."  until he was worn out and couldn't go on any longer.....

The neighbors would load him up in a wheelbarrow and bring him back home in the evening.  Adolphs youngest daughter told me of that.



Nicholas and Elizabeth... My Great Great grandfather and great great grandmother... both still residing in Brockton.

I thought it was rather cool that they lived in one of the houses that was pretty near to the one in the set of old time photos.  

Maybe some of my relatives in that pix too.