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Archive: 2022 (13 Posts)

Winter Poster Masterpieces

Posted by: Jan Grenci

My latest Flickr album is titled Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow. Featured in it is a poster advertising the December 1895 issue of Lippincott’s Monthly Magazine. Designed by Joseph J. Gould, it shows a holly-festooned woman carrying the latest issue of the magazine as the snow swirls around her: In the …

Special Delivery: Railway Express Agency

Posted by: Jan Grenci

Take a look at this colorful poster, designed by Robert E. Lee, a California-born painter and commercial artist who lived in New York City, and published in 1929. The company advertised on this poster, the Railway Express Agency (REA), was an American package delivery service. Operating between 1918 and 1975, they used railroads as one …

Smiling woman dressed in outdoor winter clothes holds a large, old-style camera

From Apples to Autumn Leaves

Posted by: Jan Grenci

When searching in the Prints and Photographs Online Catalog (PPOC), one fascinating image can often lead to another. That is what happened when I was looking for apple images for the latest Flickr album How Do You Like These Apples? I included this Currier & Ives lithograph from the Popular Graphic Arts Collection in the …

Send In the (Baseball) Clowns

Posted by: Jan Grenci

My latest Flickr album, focusing on images of brass instruments, includes a photograph of Nick Altrock and Al Schacht playing sousaphones: This photo and others in this blog post were taken when both men were a part of the Washington Senators organization. Both men had professional baseball careers, and were coaches when most of these …

Signs, Signs, Everywhere a Sign

Posted by: Jan Grenci

My latest Flickr album features photographs of signs from across the United States taken by Carol M. Highsmith from the late 20th century to the present day. In this blog post I’d like to focus on some older photos of signs taken for the Farm Security Administration in the late 1930s and early 1940s by …

Smiling woman dressed in outdoor winter clothes holds a large, old-style camera

Toni Frissell Fashion Umbrellas

Posted by: Jan Grenci

A while back I assembled an album for Flickr of images of umbrellas. More recently, I selected color fashion photos taken by Toni Frissell for another album. While gathering the Frissell images, I noticed that umbrellas and parasols appeared with some regularity. In some shots umbrellas shield their holders from the rain while in others …

Smiling woman dressed in outdoor winter clothes holds a large, old-style camera

Foshay Fireworks

Posted by: Jan Grenci

One image from my latest Flickr album on fireworks really caught my eye. It is a 1929 postcard of the dedication of the Foshay Tower in Minneapolis, Minnesota: The three day dedication event in August and September of 1929 included fireworks. When I first saw this postcard, I knew nothing of the Foshay Tower.  Now …

Celebrating the Red, White, and Blue

Posted by: Jan Grenci

In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson established June 14 as Flag Day, to commemorate the 1777 adoption of the “Stars and Stripes” as the national flag of the United States. Flag Day had been celebrated unofficially prior to 1916, as you can see in the first photo below. I recently gathered images from the collections of …

Smiling woman dressed in outdoor winter clothes holds a large, old-style camera

Focus on Eyeglasses

Posted by: Jan Grenci

My latest Flickr album focuses on depictions of eyeglasses in the collections of the Prints & Photographs Division. Many of the images in the group are photographs, but a number of posters and prints appear as well. I added two WPA (Work Projects Administration) posters to the mix. Take a look at some equally worthy …