Clues to dating photos

[Karyn]

From the Edgar Cayce Foundation Archives

 

 

 

You have a box of photographs. Maybe you’ve inherited them from your family, but you don’t know who most of these people are, and there aren’t any helpful notes on the back telling you the dates they were taken. Or there is a date on the back and you’re a little suspicious that it might not be the right one. Archivists encounter this problem all the time. And usually the photos we’re working with are of people that are total strangers, with no one left for us to ask for help. When you’re trying to date older photos, one way is to look at the clothes people are wearing. Familiarity with the general look of an era can give you important clues. The Edgar Cayce Foundation has an extensive collection of photographs attributed to the Cayce family. In this video, the E.C.F. archivist shows you how to figure out when each photo was taken, using a bit of fashion history. Sources: The University of Vermont Landscape Change Program article on 1860s women's clothing: https://www.uvm.edu/landscape/dating/... Mason, Meghann, "The impact of World War II on women's fashion in the United States and Britain" (2011). UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones. 1390. https://digitalscholarship.unlv.edu/c...