Figure 1.--We have no information about this German portrait except that it was taken by the Carl Becker studio in Naumburg, aS. We are able to date it to about 1900-05. The light grey cardboard and mount style was in use shortly after turn of the 20th century. The picture was probably taken between 1900-1905. Cardboard earlier in the 1890s are mostly thick, white, glacé and with gold decoration. The question that we have is do all the dolls here belong to the boy or are they studio props. We tend to think that they are studio props because it seems unlikely that mutter would have dragged all those dolls to the studio.

The style of the mount can also be useful in dating the portrait. This is something, however, HBC has not persued. We have chose to load the image portion of the old portraits so we can devote as much as possible of the image box to the actual image. Unfortunately our resources are limited and we had to make such compromises in how we deal with the availabkle imnages. In some instances the mount or holder can be larger than the actual mimage. We use the mount style somewhat to assess the chronology of undated images in the HBC caption under the image. We have not usually loaded the actual mounts. There is considerable historical value in these mounts and if we had more resources it would have been useful to also load the entire card mount. . In particular they can be used to estimate the chronology of the portait. Assessing dates is something that experts can do and it is a subject which we may eventually persue on HBC because its value in dating old portraits. Here there were both similarities and differences among countries. As a result, we have decided that it is probably best to persue this topic by country.

America

England

Germany

We have no information about this German portrait except that it was taken by the Carl Becker studio in Naumburg, aS. Notice the small "a" and a capital "S" and means "an der Saale". In Germany there are a number of places named "Naumburg" (as is the case for English speaking countries). There are different means for distinction, here with the name of the river, the "Saale", where the city is located. The "Saale" is a river leading to the "Elbe" (on of the four big river systems in Germany - Rhine, Donau, Elbe, Oder -). The "Naumburger Dom" is an important historic cathedral with famous early medieival sculptors. We are able to date it to about 1900-05. The light grey cardboard and mount style was in use shortly after turn of the 20th century. The picture was probably taken between 1900-1905. Cardboard earlier in the 1890s are mostly thick, white, glacé and with gold decoration.

Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing Web Site:
[Sailor suits] [Sailor hats] [Buster Brown suits]
[Eton suits] [Rompers] [Tunics] [Smocks] [Pinafores]

Created: 2:28 AM 1/21/2006
Last updated: 2:29 AM 1/21/2006