Smaller Collections
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Fritz J. Roethlisberger, ca. 1958. Yousuf Karsh, photographer. ©YOUSUF KARSH
Yousuf Karsh Portraits of Harvard Business School Faculty
In the Spring of 1958 internationally noted photographic portraitist Yousuf Karsh traveled to Harvard Business School to photograph prominent faculty members. Karsh did extensive research on each professor before he met and photographed them and even sat in the classroom to get a better feel for his subjects. He felt the need to understand human nature in order to get to the core of the sitter's personality. The ability to understand the subject in such depth is what gave Karsh his skill and artistry
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George Washington Bridge, ca. 1930.
Margaret Bourke-White Photograph Collection, 1928-1931
This small collection of black and white gelatin silver print images taken by Margaret Bourke-White captures industrial settings during the early 19th century. Included are pictures of American factories, mines, foundries, and glassworks. Bourke-White was able to depict otherwise dirty and dark industrial settings into beautiful images with her unique use of light.
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Vernon Evans (with his family) of Lemmon, South Dakota, near Missoula, Montana on Highway 10, 1936.
Farm Security Administration Photograph Collection, 1935-1936
This collection of black and white gelatin silver print images taken by photographers of the Farm Security Administration 1935-1936 depict the life of migrant famers and sharecroppers affected by the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl. The Farm Security Administration, and its predecessor the Resettlement Administration were government relief programs of the New Deal begun in 1935. The photographers represented in this collection include Theodor Jung, Dorothea Lange, Carl Mydans, Arthur Rothstein, and Ben Shahn.
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Ruth Page (1899-1991), ca. 1930.
1934 Art and Industry Exhibition Photograph Collection, 1934
The photographs in this collection were part of an exhibition that displayed in Rockefeller Center, New York City and The Lakeside Press Studios in Chicago in 1934. The National Alliance of Art and Industry and The Photographic Illustrators, Inc. sponsored the exhibit to promote an importance of design in commerce and industry, demonstrate that beauty and sales values were complimentary to civilization, and to emphasize a trend toward a national visual style. The photographs in the collection represent documentary photography, studio photography, and advertising photography. Most of the images in this collection are black and white gelatin silver prints however there are a small number of color prints included as well. Prominent photographers whose work is represented in this collection include Margaret Bourke-White, Russell Aikins, Alfred Cheney Johnston, Victor Keppler, Gordon Coster, Anton Bruehl, and Nickolas Muray, among others.
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Harvard-Boston Aero Meet, 1910.
Early Aviation Photograph Collection, 1909-1911
Airplanes, aviation meets, and famous flyers from the birth of aviation are documented in this collection of small-format prints, postcards, and corresponding negatives. Public interest in aviation took off after Orville and Wilbur Wright built and flew the first fully practical airplane in 1905. By 1910, air shows, exhibitions featuring planes in flight and on the ground, and meets took place in several parts of the country. Candid shots feature biplanes, monoplanes, and gliders on the ground and in flight. Locations include the International Aviation Tournament at Belmont Park in Elmont, New York, and the Harvard—Boston Aviation meets of September 1910 and 1911. Featured aviators, often pictured in planes, include Wilbur and Orville Wright, Claude Graham-White, Earle Ovington, and Eugene Ely.
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Railway car, New York, New York, 1940.
Electric Railway Photograph Collection, 1939-1940
The collection documents electric railway cars and lines in twenty-six states and in Washington, D.C. First introduced in the United States in the nineteenth century, electrification was used primarily for streetcars, trolleys, and interurban routes. These lines flourished in the United States between 1900 and 1930 but began to decline rapidly as motorcars and trucks became increasingly popular, fueled by the rapid expansion of paved roads across the nation. By 1940 many electric railway lines were abandoned. Nearly 600 small-format prints illustrate tracks and cars, many of which were already no longer in use at the time they were photographed.
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Teeming Ingots.
Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation, 1945–1970
Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation was established in 1853 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and by 1902 was the nation’s second largest producer of steel. The company had major steel works at Pittsburgh; Aliquippa, Pennsylvania; Cleveland, Ohio; and Hennepin, Illinois. In 1974, Jones and Laughlin became a wholly owned subsidiary of the LTV Corporation. The collection, circa 1945 to 1970, includes striking scenes of employees engaged in steel production, close-ups of machinery in operation, and aerial views of plants at several Jones & Laughlin Steel facilities.
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Court Street, showing Old State House,
Boston, Mass., ca. 1855.Nineteenth-Century Boston Photograph Collection, 1855-1895
This collection of albumen prints captures scenes of Boston from the mid-to-late nineteenth century. Scholars will find detailed views of businesses, busy commercial city blocks, Boston Harbor and wharves, hotels and taverns, libraries, halls, churches, government buildings (including the Old State House), and residences. Several photographs depict the aftermath of the 1872 fire. Also included is a group photograph of the National Typographical Union in 1859.
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Pierre Samuel Dupont, 1935.
Portrait Photograph Collection, ca. 1930-1940
As part of its extensive collecting efforts in the 1930s, the Business Historical Society acquired portraits representing more than 650 prominent businessmen and a few businesswomen. Included are portraits (a few bearing autographs) of Andrew Carnegie, Walter Percy Chrysler, Pierre Samuel DuPont, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, J. P. Morgan, Andrew Mellon, and Thomas Watson. Female portraits include Dorothy H. Hobson, Assistant Treasurer of Pepperell Mills and Julia Montgomery, General Partner, Ferris and Company. Some photographs are reproductions of portrait paintings, prints, or engravings.
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Eight men working on tea production, ca. 1885.
Tea Industry Photograph Collection, ca. 1885
The various stages of tea processing in villages in China and Japan are featured in a series of albumen prints and one photograph album. Tea cultivation was a part of Chinese culture for more than three centuries. Images illustrate the crews rolling and drying leaves, taster’s rooms, workers packing tea into wooden chests, and porters transporting tea chests to shippers. Also of interest are general views of people and landscapes. The images represent fine examples of nineteenth-century commercial photographs in China and Japan, some of which were delicately hand-colored by local artisans.
