By LaRae Free Kerr
The Hutchings Museum in Lehi, Utah requests help from exactly the right people. Could you be one of them? The right people are those who can identify photographs taken in Lehi between 1891 and 1934. The goal is to identify people in the portraits and places in the landscapes, so that after the pictures have been digitized by the Hutchings Museum, they can be given to family members.
The call goes out to people who lived in Lehi and surrounding areas. Think big because pictures of the fire department in Pleasant Grove, pictures from Cedar City, Salt Lake City and Cedar Fort have been found in the huge collection of about 10,000 photos. Come into the Hutchings Museum in Lehi, look over the three or four boxes of photographs currently ready to view and see if you recognize anyone.
Historians, family historians, genealogists, please come look at these pictures.
Anyone who regularly views pictures of this time period who might have a Lehi or Utah connection, see if you can identify anyone.
And if, by some miracle, you knew the professional photographers who worked in the studio above Broadbent’s Department Store, or you have photos stamped with their names, or you have any of their files, please contact Susan Whitaker at the Museum immediately.
The photographers who worked above the department store at 128 North 100 East in Lehi, were Edward W. Broadbent and C. D Thurldon, starting in 1891. LeBlond and Joseph F Russon took over in 1896. William and Mary Clyde Willes took photos there from 1896 to 1902. William Asher 1899-1902, C. E. Ward 1905, Karl J. and Johannah Thompson 1909-1920 were followed by Larson and Rollow 1920, E. L. Chapel 1921, Snyder 1924 and the Hansen Brothers in 1934.
Many proofs from all these photographers were stored in the department store whose owners generously donated them to the museum. Identifying the subjects of the photographs is a primary concern of the museum. That’s why your help is needed. To continue the generosity of the donors, the museum will give the pictures to the families they belong to after digitizing them.
To aid in this vibrant community cause, contact Susan Whitaker through the museum website: www.hutchingsmuseum.org. Plans are in place for “white glove” parties and other events to encourage people to come in, identify pictures and eventually take them home. Are you one of the right people for this project?
Speaking of photographs, the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers has added an index of their photograph collection to their website, http://www.dupinternational.org/. Not digitized, the pictures are indexed by surnames for men and the last married names of women. Pictures can be ordered from the site. Visit often, the DUP site admonishes, for new names will be added to the index regularly.
Of course, the Library of Congress site has many digitized pictures available for research purposes, http://lcweb2.loc.gov/pp/pphome.html. Some of the photographs are in public domain, others need permission to use.
Library of Congress pictures cover all times and places. When I entered the term “Pioche, Nevada,” a picture of the old million dollar courthouse appeared. I entered the word “Lehi,” and twenty-four pictures came up, only one for Lehi, Utah. The others had to do with raising cotton in Lehi, Arkansas. Twenty-seven pictures came up for the term “making soap.”
A pictorial timeline of the building of the Strawberry Dam in Payson, Utah is available from the Library of Congress. Civil War pictures of various companies are included as well as some individual soldiers. Whatever you may need for your history may be in the Library of Congress pictorial archives.
A handy index for Library of Congress pictures is also available through the Ancestry.com Photos & Maps section, though it is not complete. Other pictures are digitized on Ancestry such as Public Member Photos, U. S. Family Photographs, U.S. Civil War photos, Passenger Ships and Images, and the Historical Postcards Collection.
Some pictures can be found at http://library.usu.edu/Specol/searchengines2.html, Utah State University’s collection. Or you can enter the name of the state you are interested in plus the phrase “digitized photograph collection” or some variation of those terms to find picture collections at local universities.
Look at www.cyndislist.com for pictures of people and places of interest and try Deadfred at http://www.deadfred.com/. The New York Public Library has more than half a million digitized photos at http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/index.cfm from all over the world.
Photographs are always useful to family historians. But without careful analysis, researchers can ignore details that are meaningful. To help in the analysis of pictures, the National Archives has created a form called “Photo Analysis Worksheet.” It is available at http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/worksheets/photo_analysis_worksheet.pdf.
While visiting the National Archives site, be sure to check the genealogy section at http://www.archives.gov/genealogy/ and their index of photographs at http://aad.archives.gov/aad/series-list.jsp?cat=IT40.
Please help identify the Broadbent Department Store photographs. In the meantime, look at all these other photo collections for inspiration.
LaRae Free Kerr, M. ED. can be reached at Itsallrelatives@sfcn.org.
