A 'Swenglish' journey through family photos, notes and postcards
from the early 20th century.
Showing posts with label childhood. Show all posts
Showing posts with label childhood. Show all posts

2023-12-09

At the Kitchen Table - Sepia Saturday 702

 


Going through another envelope of old photos, I found this one of me and my grandmother Sally at her kitchen table (well, with me on the table...) A note on the back says  August 1958, which means I'm 3 years old here. Below is a  version where I tried to better the faded colours somewhat in Picasa3 (my standard simple editing tool). 


In my own early childhood photo albums nearly all the photos are black and white, taken by either my father or my grandfather, and developed at home. This may be the earliest colour photo print I've come across so far, and I'm not sure who of them may have been the first to experiment with putting a colour film into their camera for a change. (I know my dad also took slides sometimes, though, so perhaps it could also be a print made from a slide.)




2023-10-29

Portraits of Young Gustaf - Sepia Saturday 696

Among various photos in an envelope marked "Before 1930" I recently found this childhood portrait of my grandfather Gustaf T. It's one I can't recall ever having seen before - it's not included in his photo albums.


I doubt I would even have recognised this boy as my grandfather if the photo had not been found together with other later photos of him (probably sorted at some point by my father).

Gustaf was born in 1904, and I'm not sure which year this was taken, but this is probably  the earliest photo of him that exists. I don't know the year but I'm guessing ~ 1909. The outfit he's wearing does not look like anything I've ever seen! - but it vaguely reminds me of illustrations of Little Lord Fountleroy (book by Frances Hodgson Burnett from1886...) 

This is where Gustaf grew up though - more like "the little house on the prairie"!



Until I found the portrait at the top, this one was the earliest I had - found in one of my grandmother Sally's albums. A childhood portrait of Gustaf (born 1904) together with my grandmother's brother Nils (born 1902). I'm guessing it may be from Gustaf starting school (1911). - At first, I only recognised Nils in this photo, and had no idea who the other boy was. It was only later that it dawned on me that it must be Gustaf, and that he and Nils had been friends since early childhood.

 
They're also both in this Sunday School photo from 1912. Gustaf (8 years old) is 4th from the left. Nils (10 years old) is 5th from the right (front row).



And this is from the village football (soccer) team, a few years later. Nils is (unmistakably) the tall one in the background (captain/coach?), and Gustaf the one with the "attitude" standing in front of him... 

I remember that it was comparing it to another photo of the two of them as grown up young men that convinced me who was Gustaf in the football photo!



This is another photo from the envelope, which I can't recall having seen in any album. 

I also found two portraits from his military service in 1925:


This I suppose may be the one that he sent to my grandmother Sally in a letter that year. (Referred to in one of her letters to him.)


And this one is glued onto a hard cardboard frame with the embossed text "Memory from my military service".