Identity elements
Name and location of repository
Level of description
Item
Title
Photo album: Couples travel album to the Caribbean in the 1930s during the Trinidad Hurricane
Date(s)
- circa 1930s (Creation)
Extent
Content and structure elements
Scope and content
"Oblong quarto measuring 13' x 10'. Screw bound black leather boards with gilt decorations. Contains 106 gelatin silver black and white or sepia toned photographs measuring between 1.5' x 1' and 9' x 6.5' without captions.
An aesthetically pleasing photo album of a couple's vacation to Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean, circa the 1930s. The album starts with a hand drawn illustration of a woman. From there, the photographs are of various places around San Fernando, Trinidad, and Tobago. Most of the photographs include a smaller gelatin silver photograph sized 1.5' x 1' and a larger blown up and printed version of the photograph. The Nariva ferry is one of the first pictures seen before several photographs of baby pictures. The album then focuses on the flora and working class of the island. Pictures of flowers, forest trails, and rivers can be seen stretching for miles, all of which are well shot. Some cities are also photographed, possibly from overhead as many twinkling lights can be seen in the photograph. There are several pictures of the working class on the island with shots of them getting water or working in a hay mill. There are several candid shots of people, one of a man praying, some of young girls smiling, and an interesting photograph of a little boy with a boa constrictor wrapped around his neck and body.
The couple also takes pictures of each other with shots of them wakeboarding and enjoying the beach, one of which shows the woman in front of the setting sun creating a silhouette of her shape in an aesthetically pleasing photograph. Another shows the couple visiting an airfield with well shot photographs of the planes. There is a portrait shot of the wife that was printed and negatives of the husband holding the couple's dogs, which are pictured again in a larger photograph. Towards the end there are several photos of damage left from the Trinidad hurricane with roofs peeled off of buildings and just the frames of houses left up with the wife looking dismayed around the rubble.
There are some random photographs that looks like they may have been used in magazine advertising as one shows a turkey with loves of bread for Thanksgiving and another shows small clay penguins posed next to a box of 'Kool Cigarettes.'" --Description from Between the Covers Rare Books