Photo History Today

To kick off our new monthly historical photo feature, let’s taking a look at this interesting shot of Bench Car #1906 in Adams Square of Boston.

If you’re looking for the best of the best in photo events this fall, you’re in the right place. Whether you’re a vintage camera enthusiast or just getting started, these happenings are sure to delight and inspire.

The Boston Athenaeum is hosting Wild Flowers of New England, featuring images by Massachusetts-based photographer Edwin Hale Lincoln. His efforts over more than thirty years were dedicated to documenting and…

Climate disasters put photo archives at risk. Explore the growing challenges in preserving our visual history and efforts to protect it for future generations.

PHSNE notes, with sadness, the passing of Michel Auer (1933–2024) on October 22nd.

The rise of the spiritualist movement fueled the popularity of spirit photography in the 19th century. These ghostly images were usually produced through creative use of multiple exposure.

William S. Johnson has produced a detailed annotated biography and an annotated bibliography, both of interest to collectors.

Learn more about William H. Walker and his box-form single exposure camera.

Ken Hough shares how he learned that Deardorff made the big, heavy cameras Kodak used to shoot the Kodak Colorama.

Catch these exhibits at the MFA, MASS MoCA, and more.

Stephen Shames has been the official photographer of the Black Panther Party since his student days at the University of California, Berkeley. Twenty-seven are on display at the Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts in an exhibit titled Comrade Sisters: Women of the Black Panther Party. Plus, more exhibits ending soon.

Annie Powell spent five decades, 1892-1942, photographically documenting life in Lowell.

Home Movies: A History of the American Industry 1897-1979, by Alan Kettelle This year marks the 100th anniversary (July 5, 1923) of 16mm movies. The most significant features of the CineKodak 16mm system were safety film and B&W reversal film.

“Developing Boston: Berenice Abbott & Irene Shwachman Photograph a Changing City“ features the first joint presentation of work by two pioneering photographers of the 1930s and 1960s, capturing a Boston…

An Impressive Stereo Viewer With An Interesting Provenance The device pictured above was acquired from the Jack Naylor collection. After he passed, much of his collection was turned over to an…

Two powerful local exhibitions on view this fall bring the Black Experience face-to-face with audiences up close, seeing how 180+ years of photographic images offer a painfully slow recognition of…

“It is the worst of times; it is the best of times,” said the hapless photographer searching for the right color film he could use to shoot at Photographica 90….

Photographica 90 is just 48 hours away. This is the 50th Anniversary Year for PHSNE and for the Photographica Show and Sale. Both began in 1973 … and here we…

It would be difficult for modern readers to accept the text-only version of a newspaper.   One online source containing “a brief history of the birth of photojournalism,” states that…

A note on this story: Chris Farnsworth, from the Burlington weekly Seven Days, together with the key figure who re-discovered the Lumière Brothers factory in Burlington, Hugo Martínez Cazón, published this…

The December 2022 Snap Shots newsletter had short item on the back page from the Library of Congress (LOC) Picture This blog titled: Mapping Anthony Angel’s Photographs of Manhattan. It…

Autumn is a great time of year in New England. Leaves may be falling, but museums, galleries, auction houses, and photo-oriented organizations are putting up new exhibits, showcasing new work,…

A prototype Leica “0” camera (#105) that belonged to Oscar Barnack, inventor of the Leica series, crushed previous auction records as well as the pre-auction estimates. The camera, auctioned at…

UPDATE: The March 16 auction of Reiner Riedler’s  20 photographs raised 42,000€ for aid to Ukrainian refugees. – WestLicht Museum, March 17, 2022   On his twelve journeys through Ukraine (from…

Sometimes photo history just drops something remarkable in your lap. In this case, PHSNE’s esteemed newsletter editor Beverly Regelman came across The Public Domain Review and put a short note…

Happy Birthday to The Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain. It was founded on January 20, 1853, and is the oldest continuously-operating photographic society in the world. The RPS has…

Just in time for the holidays, author Ann Marks has published her “definitive” biography of the enigmatic Vivian Maier. When the contents of Vivian Maier’s storage unit were auctioned off…

Daguerre (1787-1851), a Parisian theater set designer who staged elaborate hand-painted screens that depicted far away lands like the Swiss Alps, is credited with creating the first complete photographic process,…