Easter Brains

I've been searching through the Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Online Catalog for photographs of Easter. Initially, I was looking for Easter images of Buffalo which there are many particularly religious ceremonies with the Polish community but none that resonate with my own experiences as a kid. Instead, I found these images taken by Bain agency. Initially I thought the scans were made from duplicate preservation prints and not the original glass negatives which is unfortunate. Duplicate prints do not represent the glass negative's fantastic depth of field and always eviscerate the essence of the image. But looking over the images' catalog records, I see the scans were indeed made from the original 5 x 7 inch glass negatives. Regardless, it is very comforting to see Union Square look very much the same complete with shoppers selecting their Easter flowers.

LOC dates the photographs April 18, 1908. No restrictions on the images.

Buffalo, New York

I can never find images that articulate Buffalo for me. Library of Congress documents the industrial hey days. Grain mills, Erie Canal, World's Exposition and the Catholics. Lionel Rogosin takes care of the rest. I like his photographs but they do not document my own history. His portraits document something diminishing in Buffalo. Eventually it would all go to hell. His photographs reflect the death of the industrial age for African Americans but my father and his ilk still were hanging on. Suburban ranch housing and the white folk blue collar work force still had a tiny piece of the Buffalo pie. Benefits, pensions and salaries to comfortably support a family. So I found this broad. The fleshy, good humored types who littered my childhood. She was at the picnics, on the beach gossiping with my aunt, attended my parents parties, paid me no mind, laughed loud, drank a lot, ate a lot and more or less lived a lot.

It isn't out of copyright. Its from the Library of Congress. 1943.