Tuesday, January 25, 2011

black-and-white trio

I opened a recent New Yorker magazine yesterday to this Alfred Stieglitz photo. Gasp! Nothing like running unexpectedly into an old friend. This is the postcard version of the photo. It's another card that I have been loath to part with but which, I know, shall soon go somewhere. Cards such as these remind me that black-and-white photography is the best, though most people probably already look on it as something from the pre-digital dark ages. I missed it but a show of Alfred Stieglitz photos was on at Seaport Museum New York, in New York City, until January 10.

About the time that PostMuse was sending the card below, I was mailing this one to her. It shows McSorley's, a famed saloon in New York City, which until 1970 did not allow women to enter. (A law suit finally changed that.) I've only been once to McSorley's and was totally turned off by the suburban 'frat boy' tenor of the clientele.

PostMuse sent this excellent retro card of students at the Dilworth School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It's from a century ago, when schools taught children about growing vegetables. Now that farmers' markets are again everywhere, I wonder how many public schools these days have gardening projects for their students. That's quite a harvest by the kids in the photo.