Figure 1.-- Percy Loomis Sperr is one of the least known photographers in American photographic history which is surprising because many of his photograohs are ell known and he becnme known as 'the official photographer of New York'. His interest seems to have been primarily with structures, but there are photographs with people as well. Here are children reading at the Mulberry Community House in the Bronx. We are not extirely sure what a communiy center was, but we think it was rather like a settlement house, but without such a strong focus on immigrants. By the 1920s, immigrants in America were increasingly entering the Americam maintream. The photograph was taken September 23, 1926. That was a Thursday, so the children would have come to the Center after school. Perhaps their mothers worked.

Percy Loomis Sperr was born in Michigan (1889), the grandson of German immigrants. His brother and sister were died fter contracting meningitis. he disease left Percy crippledfor life. He had to use crutches to get around which probbly in part explains his focus on structures. Sperr married a German immigrant named Louise and they had a son Robert (1920). Sperr aspired to be an author and moved his family to New York. He intended to use phoitography to illustrate his stories. But Sperr soon found that while he was able to sell his photographs, there was little market for his articles which seems to have bothered him. His photographs sold, his stories didn’t. It probably never sat all that well with him that he wasn’t able to pursue his real love which was writing. His photography led to a contract with the New York Public Library. He became known as the 'Official Photographer for the City of New York'. Thus beginning in 1924, he tirelessly combed the five New York boroughs, capturing images of the city for posterity, buildings, other structures, and neighborhoods. As part of his street photography, he took more than 30,000 photographs of New York and New Yorkers. Sperr was relentless. He explored every major street, every neighborhood, every bridge, every highway, every building, basically every corner of the city. He has left an invaluable body of images depicting the life of the city in the inner-War era. His photographic efforts was conducted through the early-1940s. He covered all five boroughs, but his favorite subject was Staten Island where he lived. He called it the Cinderella of boroughs. He also gave special attention to the port areas of the city and the ships there. Children were not a major focus of his work which concentrated more on structures than people, but in compiling his photographic collection we see countless people, including children.

Created: 2:58 PM 12/12/2012
Last updated: 2:58 PM 12/12/2012