Turn It Over! There's Something On The Back! - September 2014

Very often, notations on the reverse of these found photographs are obscure or too brief or illegible. Most often there is nothing at all.

But now and then there is a message from the past that sparkles.

Back in March of 2009 LOST GALLERY had a full page of photographs and their very interesting reverse sides. There have been many new additions to the collection since then.

Here is a new group of those photographs with mysterious, funny and sometimes puzzling reverse sides; tiny bits of history, reaching out to us over the decades and sometimes centuries.

On the reverse:
I want to know
how much bigger
Willie looks to the
side of Jerrold this
Boy is some pumpkin
in to everything
Nellia said this eaaning(?)
He climbs up on the
table in to the slofrbu(?)
ect(?), bet you can laugh when
you yet this picture kiss
Gerrold for me assssvesn (arriving)
soon with Love to all
Mother

enhanced

Reverse:
A Happy
New Year
From
Dave Flarrie (?)

Photographer:
R. J. Booth,
Columbia
Mo.

And some printing practice ...

Reverse:
Reverse:
Charle
Groverkoshe or Giverhoske or something.

Post Card reverse design in use about 1904 -1918

On the reverse
Charleys Grandma Smith
Dads Gr Grandma


Photographer:
Eskelsen & Fritz
Mt. Carroll
Ills.

On the Reverse:
Numbers that don't make a lot of sense.

Here is an unusual reverse. This card mounted photograph was apparently stored in a stack with another or perhaps many others, for a long, long time.

The image of the NEXT photograph in the stack has transferred its image to the reverse of this portrait. It happens now and then but in this case the image is very clear and well defined. To see an enhanced version of this back go HERE.

A little odd: It seems to credit two photographers and has two identifications of the portrait.
Photographers (imprinted front and reverse)
W. G. I. A. Thuss
Practical Photographers
No. 230 1/2 N. Cherry Street
McGavock Block
Nashville, Tennessee
and ALSO stamped on reverse:
F. E. Turner
Portraits and Frames
3043 Lake Park Ave.

Written on reverse:
Susie A Howard (Caligaiphy)
and in pen
Mrs P M Bell
1025 Ohio
Wichita Kansas

A few random numbers in a childish scrawl.

Photographer:
Graham's City Gallery,
S. E. Corner of Square, Mexico, Mo.

On Reverse:
More childish scrawl

(and at the very bottom)
Knellomae Quisenben (possibly)


Photographer
C. R. Edwards
Bowling Green, KY

Reverse
Aunt Loretta
Mother's sister

On reverse:
My Mother
Kathryn Calhoun

In breakfast room-
some of her flowers-
She got more later-

Postcard design in use 1904 - 1918

On the reverse:
Agnes Dumars
Emporia, Kans.

Reverse:
Feb. 20, 1941
Age 84
Grand Mud is my
mother dad Zeta Pfeiffer

There are now more than 8,000 photographs in the Lost Gallery.

The most popular photographs
An album of the most requested photographs in the Lost Gallery.

Area 51 and a Half
You are probably not authorized to see these.

Don't take my picture! Oh! You DID didn't you!
This is a collection of photographs that disappear on the way home from the photo processing shop.

BACK TO
THE MAIN INDEX PAGE
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BACK PAGE INDEX

And don't miss
Cabinet Card Gallery
Penny Tales
Square America
Tattered and Lost Vernacular Photography
The best FOUND PHOTOGRAPH sites on the web.
And for postcards try
THE DAILY POSTCARD.

All images are the property of Lost Gallery and the author. Permission must be granted for their use. All rights reserved.

THE KIDS
It is always a mystery how a photograph of any of these precious children could end up lost or abandoned.
Here are a few.
You will probably say "Ooh..." at least once.

Dee and the Business School
The beautiful Dee. A curious story, What do you see?

WHAT'S GOING ON HERE?

"What are they doing?"