… whatever its size.
May 15: International Day of the Family
| Supper time across the Commons … |  Oregon State University Archives |
| Hot dogs! nom nom |  New York Public Library |
| Mmmmmmmmmm, nom nom … catfish! |  State Library of New South Wales |
| Pie! nom! |  George Eastman House |
| Eels? nom? |  Powerhouse Museum |
| nom nom nom nom nom nom |  Nantucket Historical Association |
| New glass plate negatives from the Powerhouse Museum.
One of these things is not like the other … |
 Phillips Glass Plate Negatives Collection |
| North African ruins, by popular demand at the Brooklyn Museum, featuring Tebessa, Algeria, and Roman ruins. |  North Africa: Ruins |
| From the Oregon State University Archives, photos of logging camps by Arthur M. Prentiss. Love that Pacific Northwest scenery. This is Three Fingered Jack near Bend, Oregon. |  May 6, 2009 New Additions to the Williams Collection |
| Machinery, including a Hercules art deco vacuum cleaner, at the State Library of New South Wales. Great photography from the acclaimed Sam Hood. |  Art Deco |
| It’s definitely spring at the Library of Congress! Polo, Meadowlands, big ships with guns, noted politicians and baseball! |  News in the 1910s |
| From the Biblioteca de Arte–Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian: new sets in its collections of Portuguese architecture. This week they’ve got monuments of Gothic architecture in the Póvoa de Varzim, Portugal. |  Concelho da Póvoa de Varzim |
| They’ve also added some color photographs to their Lisbon set. |  Lisboa |
| More by Carl Curman, from the Swedish National Heritage Board.
Who are these seven men in a garden? |
 Carl Curman |
| And we welcome LIGC ~ NLW: Llyfrgell Genedlaethol Cymru / The National Library of Wales – to the Commons! |  The National Library of Wales |
Cymru am byth!
We warmly welcome The National Library of Wales to the Flickr Commons! Established in 1907 and now with over 800,000 photographs preserving the heritage and culture of Wales, they start their Commons adventure with 100 photographs from the P B Abery collection, photographs taken between 1890 and 1940 in Radnorshire, the border area of Wales and England.
We can’t say it better than they do, so to quote them …
As you’ll see the photos include the weird and wonderful – including turkeys blocking the road and a dog smoking a pipe!
Cyfarchion – Now you know how to greet people in Welsh!
| Probably the most iconic mother of all, the Migrant Mother by Dorothea Lange. |  George Eastman House |
| C. & N.W. R.R. Cloe Weaver, mother of four children, employed as a helper at the roundhouse, Clinton, Iowa, by Jack Delano. |  Library of Congress |
| Calla Lundström Curman — writer, editor, feminist, and conservationist — with her children, Sigurd and Carolina Curman. |  Swedish Heritage Board |
| Actress Helen Twelvetrees and her son Jack Woody. |  State Library of New South Wales |
| Aboriginal family near Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, 1919. |  Musée McCord |
| Miccosukee mother rocks her baby in a hammock. |  State Library and Archives of Florida |
-hat tip to george for this one!
Changing New York, 1935—1938 is an important set in the holdings of the New York Public Library. This work was made under the Federal Art Project (FAP) in 1935 by acclaimed photographer Berenice Abbott, to document New York City.
 Herald Square, 34th and Broadway, Manhattan |
 Greyhound Bus Terminal, 33rd and 34th Streets between Seventh and Eighth Avenues, Manhattan |
The FAP funded many such projects for unemployed artists as part of the New Deal. A book was published of her work in 1939, in time for the World’s Fair in Flushing Meadow, NY. The FAP distributed complete sets of Abbott’s images to high schools, libraries and other public institutions.
 Tri-boro Barber School, 264 Bowery, Manhattan |
 Penn Station, Interior, Manhattan |
Berenice Abbott was one of the avant garde artists in New York’s Greenwich Village in the 1920s and ’30s. She studied portraiture in France under Man Ray and Eugène Atget. Abbott became best known for her architecture shots and urban street scenes, and she continued capturing the heart of the Big Apple until her death in 1991.
 Brooklyn Bridge, Water and Dock Streets, looking southwest |
 Murray Hill Hotel, from Park Avenue and 40th Street, Manhattan |
Won’t you help tag this collection? By tagging the photographs in the Commons, you help others find items more readily. This particular set could use Abbott’s name, “New York City” or “NYC”, as well as the locations and buildings in the photographs.
With the entry of Chicago’s Field Museum into the Flickr Commons last week, we noticed that we have a very good collection across the Commons of photographs from the historic 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition (a.k.a. Chicago World’s Fair). Held at a crucial time in that city’s history after the ruin of the Great Fire, this fair focused on the stunning technologies of electricity and the elegant architectural planning of Daniel Burnham and Frederick Law Olmsted. The fair led to a revolution in how cities were planned, and can be seen as a starting point for the urban planning profession as we know it. The above photograph depicts the Edison “Genii of Electricity” … however, Edison’s DC current technology lost its bid to light up the Exposition to Westinghouse and Tesla’s AC current.
| The Smithsonian Institution coordinated all of the U.S. Government exhibits and prepared a display on its activities and collections for the Exposition.
This is the south canal and the Electricity Building. |
 Smithsonian Institution |
| The Brooklyn Museum has holdings of the Exposition from its Goodyear Archival Collection.
This is the same location as above, but shot with a narrower lens. |
 Brooklyn Museum |
| The Field Museum has a wealth of photos of the Exposition from photographer William Henry Jackson.
This is the same view north as above, between the Electricity and Manufactures-Liberal Arts Buildings. |
 Field Museum Library. |
The Ferris wheel made its first appearance at the Exposition. Built by George Ferris, this 264-foot-high carnival ride had 36 cars, each of which held up to 60 people. One car even had a band that played when the wheel was in motion. The view from the top? Sweeping.
 Field Museum Library |
 Brooklyn Museum |
 Brooklyn Museum |
 Field Museum Library |
The Field Museum’s contribution to the Commons is important in these ways:
|
 Field Museum |
A challenge for you, the viewer: With this wealth of photography all of the same event, can you recreate a panorama or mashup that shows the breadth of the exhibition? Here’s a starter for you by Brian Karpuk (newsburgler on Flickr); he’s got a few great Expo write-ups for more info:
Panorama of the World's Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
Here are also two nifty overlays of the Expo mapped in Google Earth or in your browser with a plug-in. Maybe someone enterprising can combine this data with the photos and the photo overlay info we posted about earlier this week. Fun!
We hope this tantalizes you into contributing your research to the Commons photos and inspires you to take these images and re-create the long-gone White City in all its grandeur.
Roketpad and zyrcster each contributed to this article.| The Field Museum in Chicago entered the Commons last week with a wealth of sets. Here are a few you shouldn’t miss, starting with the archives of their early years. |  Field Columbian Museum (1894-1920) |
| The museum opened in 1894, located in the Palace of Fine Arts building on the grounds of the World’s Columbian Exposition. |  1893 World’s Columbian Exposition |
| Colorful scenes from the Wildflower Preservation Society, Illinois Chapter, 1902. |  Flower Children |
| The Flickr Commons group loves animals, and the Field Museum does not disappoint! |  Lincoln Park Zoo, Chicago |
| Timber! The Oregon State University Archives posts the Harold Frodsham Photograph Collection, including images of lumber mills in Oregon during Frodsham’s tour of mills in Oregon and northern California. |  The Harold Frodsham Collection Images of Oregon’s Mills |
| Like a good mystery? Then join the Powerhouse Museum on a Palmer Mystery Hike with photographer Thomas Lennon. |  Thomas Lennon Photographic Collection |
| Workers of the World Unite! Or at least do that on May Day. The Nationaal Archief brings us images of May Days past. |  1 mei / Labour Day |
| From the Brooklyn Museum, installation shots of Tavares Strachan’s The Distance Between What We Have and What We Want (Arctic Ice Project), 2004-08. A 2.5-ton block of ice from the Arctic! |  Arctic Ice Project Installation |
| The Library of Congress posts 50 more photos from the Bain News Service: baseball, diplomats and great mustaches! |  News in the 1910s |
| The Biblioteca de Arte–Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian always delights with their black and white architecture images. These are by Robert Chester Smith. |  Talha em Elvas, Portugal |
| They also have wonderful photographs by Smith of the beautiful Church of Our Lady of the Angels in Lisbon. |  Igreja dos Anjos, Lisboa, Portugal |
| Idyllic scenes of tranquil Lysekil, Sweden, from the Swedish National Heritage Board. |  Carl Curman – Sweden |
