Condition Report
Contact Information
Lot 104
Sale 2070 - American Historical Ephemera & Photography, including African Americana
Lots Open
Feb 14, 2025
Lots Close
Feb 27, 2025
Timed Online / Cincinnati
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Estimate
$400 -
600
Price Realized
$540
Sold prices are inclusive of Buyer’s Premium
Lot Description
[EARLY PHOTOGRAPHY]. Photos and postcards of African American subjects, incl. agricultural scenes.
9 x 7 in. silver gelatin print on larger cardstock mount printed "Cotton Market, Montgomery, Alabama / The Philadelphia Museums" below image and to lower right (toning, spotting, wear and some losses to mount edges and corners). Verso bears lengthy printed caption, in part: "It will be seen that almost all the people in the picture are negroes...The few white men in the picture, walking among the wagons, are probably the buyers." Pictured is a public square in Montgomery filled with African American cotton sellers with bales of cotton, cotton buyers, carts, and mules, all arranged before storefronts laden with signage. -- 6 5/8 x 4 5/8 in. silver gelatin print on slightly larger colored paper mount (silvering tot image). Uncredited. An African American woman wearing a gingham shirt with rolled up sleeves and a mobcap poses with a cart of enormous melons. -- And 2 others including a real photo postcard showing an African American family standing outside of a small wooden restaurant by Eddy, South Pines, NC, and a rural homestead photograph of an African American family. -- Together, 4 photographs.
[With:] 2 3/8 x 4 in. advertising card for Honest Long Cut Tobacco featuring a portrait of an African American man wearing a straw hat and holding a riding crop or whip, and sitting against a landscape painted backdrop (toning, wear with crease to left side and some light chipping). These advertising cards were issued in the 1890s by W. Duke & Sons, Co. in various series. The card featured here was part of the Sunny South series, which pictured African American subjects in racist or exaggerated situations.
[Also with:] 7 1/4 x 11 1/2 in. album containing approx. 150 printed postcards of Black subjects, including occupational and domestic scenes as well as stereotypical representations, ca early-to-mid 20th century. Postcards displayed under photo corner tabs, which are affixed recto/verso to album pages. While some include handwritten notations on front or back, many appear to be unused (toning to some, but overall very good condition).
This lot is located in Cincinnati.







