My View of Life on the Dock
Thank you to all the road crews and good eggs shoveling public ways!
Digging out photos: A few after the winter storm scenes of downtown Gloucester by 9:30AM 12/18/2020. Any surface brick or stone is slick as can be. Evergreen pine trees & wreaths were randomly frosted like the Kancamagus Highway. Yet snow was already gone from the marsh.
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Photo submitted by Janet Tang, from her recent trip to Portugal.
The statue similar to our own Fisherman at the Wheel, was erected in 1934 in Porto Portugal, he faces the Atlantic Ocean.
Big October skies for Gloucester, MA. Yesterday’s afternoon rainbow was radiant, vast and fast
photos from Boys Coach Armando Marnoto- thanks for sharing!
Over the April 2017 school vacation, Gloucester High School students and chaperones traveled to Spain and Portugal. Report from the trip:
Mr. Celestino Basile, World Language Coordinator at the High School, led the group through visits to Madrid, Toledo, Cordoba, Seville, Costa del Sol, & Granada, as well as many other fascinating spots in Spain before heading to Lisbon, Portugal. Basile has brought many groups of GHS students to Europe over the years. While in Seville, on Easter Sunday, some of the Spanish exchange students who had visited Gloucester in September 2016 (staying for 3 weeks with GHS students and their families, and attending GHS with their hosting student) were able to meet up with and visit the Gloucester group. What an amazing opportunity for these kids, thanks to Mr. Basile! Highlights included a flamenco evening, an evening cruise, visiting the beach at Costa del Sol, and re-connecting with the exchange students who had visited Gloucester.
In Gloucester,MA, one must experience Fisherman at the Wheel, the iconic bronze memorial by Leonard Craske installed in 1925. While in Madrid one must visit Oso y El Madrono– the bear and strawberry tree– the 1967 monument to the symbol of Madrid by artist Antonio Navarro Santafé. Bears are common symbols worldwide but a bear leaning on a strawberry tree and eating the fruit heralds solely Madrid. Before that sculpture commission, Santafé modeled Madrid’s Bear of Berlin as well as sculpture gifts for dignitaries based on Madrid’s memorable coat of arms. Madrid’s bear was modeled on a local one* captured in the Picos de Europa mountains and sent to the zoo in El Retiro. “The bear, more than Difficult, it is ungrateful, because it is animal in a heavy way, and the sculptor has to guess its anatomy through its imposing fur coat. Anyway, like everything done by God, and for Nature, it is beautiful.”
The Gloucester High School students were there! And the Prado, and…
Antonio Navarro Santafe, Parque de Berlin Oso de Berlin, Madrid
“37 students, 6 chaperones, 2 countries and 1 Spanish tour guide = ONE AMAZING TRIP! The GHS trip to Spain and Portugal was an exciting, educational and exhausting excursion! We landed on Wednesday, April 12 and started sightseeing right away (El Prado museum, to see Las Meninas, el Greco, among other masterpieces). There were cathedrals, churches, plazas and palaces. A highlight was the reunion with Spanish students that lived here in Gloucester last fall. Students spoke and listened to a lot of Spanish, then Portuguese as we finished in Lisbon. As a middle school Spanish teacher at O’Maley, I was so grateful for the experience: my first time chaperoning an overseas trip, and my first time to Spain! The kids will never forget this trip, and neither will I!”- Heidi Wakeman
Sevilla, Spain from Heidi
Chaperones, Toledo Spain, from Heidi
*Local inspiration:
Anna Hyatt Huntington modeled Joan of Arc at her Annisquam home Seven Acres in part from poses of her niece, Clara, and Frank, a ‘magnificent Percheron’ from the Gloucester fire department. The Gloucester cast is a monument to the WW1 heroes of Gloucester. Leonard Craske’s Gloucester Fisherman at the Wheel is a debated composite.
oral history transcript 1969 A Hyatt Mayor Adores his Aunt Anna Hyatt Huntington (read by Marie Demick)
The landscape chain design encircling the site of the world famous Leonard Craske Man at the Wheel sculpture is lovely and simple. The repeating rings are an aesthetic choice and practical. There’s an understated wide ‘berth’ that’s respectful yet beckoning; one indelible memorial and thousands of ripples.
Perhaps the broken post was a snow plow? Who knows. Wonder how often a break occurs?
The color photographs were taken this morning. The black and white photographs were by Gordon Parks from his 1940s FSA photographs. The granite cenotaph markers were added in 2000.
Boys in this Gordon Parks photo remain unidentified.
The snow was so pretty while it lasted.
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GO PATRIOTS FROM GLOUCESTER
There was a respectful area set aside for the participants and families and incredible music. The poignant service made many cry.
Mayor Romeo-Theken sweeping gesture to the Fort, a heartfelt and knowing welcome
I folded some of Pauline Bresnahan’s great photographs into my photos for this post. Thanks for sharing, Pauline, they’re beautiful! I may add in excerpts from Linda Greenlaw’s beautiful tribute – optimism and the program details.
You can search prior year GMG coverage like this David Cox one and many more.
Marty Luster’s 2016 video and audio brings you there.
The 2016 announcement and Gordon Parks 1943 photograph from that year’s memorial service
For the latest on the proposed David Black sculpture controversy, read Bing McGilvray’s letter in today’s Gloucester Daily Times. The letter is not yet posted online as of 10am this morning, but you can read it on the opinion page in the paper or here:
“Today’s Editorial, City’s arts policy must define room for public input, leads off with the insinuation that every new work of public art is always met with some degree of negativity, followed by this statement: “Indeed, reports indicate that some local folks didn’t immediately warm even to sculptor Leonard Craske’s 1923 Man at the Wheel…” What reports are you citing here? Whatever the source, this is absolutely untrue.” READ COMPLETE TEXT HERE: Fisherman’s Statue Was Never Controversial!
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Jeremy Goldberg, owner of Cape Ann Brewing Co. and his incredible crew have just opened their new canning facility on Whittemore Street in Gloucester…and it is gorgeous. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anything so shiny and clean! I don’t claim to know much about the process of brewing beer, but I can say that their new facility and equipment are incredibly impressive.
On Friday evening they welcomed their “Mug Club” members to tour their new digs and I was happy to tag along. To use their own words, “Fisherman’s beer — whose bold flavor and character reflect the spirit and courage of the sailors of the North Atlantic fishing fleet — is a tribute to hard work and a salute to friendships that endure.” Well, it is clear that is true, when in the presence of this group of friends/co-coworkers. They were excited, enthusiastic, and, as they should be, very proud of what they are accomplishing.
Check out their website for more information
Be on the lookout for the news cans…each design proudly showcasing the Fishermen’s Memorial Statue…and don’t forget to stop by the Pub at Cape Ann Brewing for some great eats, entertainment, and a seat on Gloucester’s Harbor before the nice weather is behind us!
Awesome things happening locally! Great work, Cape Ann Brewing Co.!
| American Photographer ARTHUR ROTHSTEIN (1915-1985)19 FSA photos in Gloucester, MA, September 1937 | |
| Joey recently featured Wallflowers, by Gordon Parks on GMG which reminded me of the road less traveled within the historic collection of photographs archived at the Library of Congress and the New York Public Library. This post is Part 2 in a series on Gloucester images in this legendary Farm Security Administration / Office of War Information (FSA/OWI) collection. You can go back to Part 1 about Gordon Parks and for some background about the program. | |
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| Arthur Rothstein is one of Roy Stryker’s elite team of FSA/OWI photographers. There are over 10,000 photos by Rothstein alone in the massive collection. Rothstein became a premier American photo journalist and the Director of LOOK (1947-1971) and Parade magazines.Director Roy Stryker brought recent graduate Arthur Rothstein to WashingtonDC to set up a state of the art dark room for the new Resettlement Administration Historical Section. In his senior year at ColumbiaUniversity, Rothstein had worked with professors Tugwell and Roy Stryker.Rothstein was 20. Stryker had him out in the field almost immediately. The job meant he had to learn how to drive a car. |  |
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| In May 1936, Rothstein’s South Dakota Badlands drought images caused controversy then, and discussion still. Rothstein’s April 1936 Oklahoma photograph of a father and his two boys fleeing Mother Nature in CimmaronCounty may be the archetypal image of the Dust Bowl.Here are a few examples and flavor of a fraction of Rothstein’s FSA work (broad themes): Mother Nature/Disaster; migrant workers and flight (showing one from MT); Gees Bend; sense of humor.Those images are followed by a few he did in Gloucester. The people are not identified in the Arthur Rothstein Gloucester photos. He’s here in 1937, the same year that the movie adaptation of Captains Courageous is a big hit.
There’s an artist in action, seen from the back. Who is it?
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| “Migratory workers returning from day’s work. Robstown camp, Texas. Everyday from twenty to thirty cars moving out from the Dakotas pass the Montana Highway Department’s port of entry.” | |
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| COLLECTION QUICK FACTS The Farm Security Administration/ Office of War (FSA/OWI)Director throughout = Roy Stryker acting akin to visionary art dealer
Photographers = Pioneers in the field of photo journalism, photography, including Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans, Arthur Rothstein, and GordonParks Library of Congress FSA/OWI collection = Nearly 280,000 objects as follows: black and white negatives (170,000+); black and white prints (100,000+); color photographs (1600+). New York Public Library has a substantial collection. 1937 Arthur Rothstein: 10,000+ images (FSA/OWI) / 19 images Gloucester.Mostly rural images. For example 1400+ images in MT and less than 40 total for MA 1942 Gordon Parks: 1600+ (FSA/OWI) / 220+ images Gloucester. Gloucester names to search for: Frank Mineo, the Alden, Vito Cannela, Vito Camella, Vito Coppola, Frank Domingos, Gaspar Favozza, Giacomo Frusteri, Vito Giocione, Pasquale Maniscaleo, Anonio Milietello, Anthony Parisi, Franasco Parisi, Dominic Tello, Antonio Tiaro, Lorenzo Scola, the Catherine C; Mary Machado, Isabell and Joseph Lopez, Dorothy and Macalo Vagos, Irene Vagos, Francis Vagos 1942 Howard Liberman: 700+ (FSA/OWI) / 150+ images Gloucester. Gloucester names to search for: John Ribiera and his wife, the vessel Old Glory There are many portraits and most are not identified. Please help. 1940 Dixon: 350+ (FSA/OWI) / one image of Gloucester; headed the lab in DC Occasionally when Stryker or the artist considered a photograph a reject, he would punch a hole through the negative. |
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| TIMELINE FOR SOME SPECIFIC IMAGE CONTEXT (primarily pre 1950)1900W.E.B. Du Bois receives a gold medal at the 1900 Paris Exposition for curating and collaborating on a major exhibit featuring 500 photographs displaying the present conditions of African Americans
1908-1917 Along with an extensive visual archive, the FSA team was extremely versed and/or required to study images. One example: Lewis Hine, a NYC school teacher and sociologist who stirred American consciences with his photos. Margaret Sage, the widow of railroad magnate, Russell Sage, established an endowment to research social sciences still active today. Hine’s Ellis Island photographs landed a staff position with the Foundation. His work for them produced their first influential impact: the Pittsburgh Survey. From there, Hines was hired by the National Child Labor Committee and his photographs over the next decade were instrumental in changing child labor laws. Also Stieglitz, Charles White, Paul Strand, and many others. 1924 Russel Smith’s North America, Its People and the Resources, Development, and Prospects of the Continent as an Agricultural, Industrial and Commercial Area 1925 Tugwell with Stryker and Thomas Munro: American Economic Life 1931 Hines was hired to photograph the construction of the EmpireStateBuilding. Ironically, despite his importance and direct influence on future photographers, the arc of his career ends with hard times. He was not included with the FSA hires.. The reception of Hines work declined so much that he was forced to sell his house. MoMA rejected his archives. George Eastman House took them in 1951. 1930s/40s Paul Robeson. Period–International influence. 1931 The continued influence of Margaret Bourke-White. Her professional career took off in 1927. FORTUNE magazine sent her to cover Russia which published Eyes on Russia in 1931. 1932 Huge audience for Mervyn Leroy’s movie I Am A Fugitive from a Chain Gang 1934 FORTUNE magazine sends Margaret Bourke-White to cover the Dust Bowl 1935 Henri Cartier-Bresson exhibits in the US 1935-1937 The Resettlement Administration Historical Section’s photographic project is tasked with documenting the crisis state of rural poverty. The government hires Roy Stryker. Stryker hires the photographers. Many other Federal creative arts programs. 1935 The government sends Dorothea Lange to photograph migrant farm workers in CA. Lange, Walker Evans and Ben Shahn already established careers when hired for the FSA but not household names. 1935 Berenice Abbott Changing New York 1936 In November, LIFE magazine’s large-scale, photo dominant iteration is first published. LIFE sold more than 13 million copies per week 1936 The Plow that Broke the Plains, Pare Lorentz with Pauls Strand, Steiner, others 1937 The movie adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s Captain’s Courageous is a huge hit. 1937 FSA/OWI Arthur Rothstein is sent to Gloucester. Depression era movie audiences purchased 60 million tickets per week. 1937 LOOK magazine starts publishing bi-weekly 1937 You Have Seen Their Faces, photo-book collaboration by Erskine Caldwell and Margaret Bourke White is wildly successful so much so that it pushes back the publication of Let Us Now Praise Famous Men by James Agee and Walker Evans (1941) 1937 The Resettlement Administration’s Historic Section folds into the Farm Security Administration (FSA). Stryker expands this photographic survey of Depression Era America, while publicizing the work of the FSA 1937/1939 Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men is published in 1937. The movie adaptation opens 1939. 1938 FSA group exhibit at the International Photographic Salon, Grand Central Palace, New York featured a selection of bleak but respectful images. Reviews felt that the photographers avoided negative stereotypes. The tone of the exhibit was so influential that it was oft repeated. Stryker felt that well over ½ the images in the collection were affirmative and positive. 1938 Richard Wright hired for the WPA Writers Project guidebook for New York and wrote the part on Harlem. He received a Guggenheim Fellowship and was able to finish Native Son. 1938 Architectural Forum introduces Frank Lloyd Wright to American audiences. Managing Editor Ruth Goodhue was the first female at the head of any Time Inc publication, and a colleague of Stryker’s. Stryker credits RUTH GOODHUE* for propelling his encyclopedic quest to catalogue every day life with what sounds now like “a distinct sense of place”, 2014 placemaking terms. Her advice to Stryker echoes the later work of Jane Jacobs** “The Death and Life of Great American Cities”, the Main Street movement, and our current cultural district designations. Thirty years later Stryker credited numerous people, but he repeats his credit to Goodhue several times. Looking back, by the time 1940 rolls along, it’s Stryker’s creed. It’s thrilling how one inspirational comment can engender such a unique mobilization! 1939 An American Exodus, photo book collaboration by Dorothea Lange and Taylor 1939 FSA photos exhibited at the 1939 World’s Fair in New York City 1939/1940 Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath is published and is phenomenally successful. The 1940 movie adaptation is a blockbuster, too. 1941 Richard Wright and Edwin Rosskam produce Twelve Million Black Voices. Migration coverage went to the city. 1941 Movies Citizen Kane (trailer 1940) and How Green Was My Valley 1942 Artists for Victory 1942 Gordon Parks’ position within Stryker’s department is underwritten with the support of a Julius Rosenwald Fellowship. Rosenwald was a partner in Sears Roebuck. His foundation operated from 1917-1948 with the mandate to focus on the well-being of mankind and with a particular education outreach for African Americans. The endowment was to be spent down completely and it’s estimated that 70 million was given. Of particular note, from 1928-1948 open-ended grants were given to African American writers, researches, and intellectuals and the list is a Who’s Who of 1930s and 1940s. This is precisely the type awarded to Gordon Parks so that he could work at the famous FSA program. 1942 Gordon Parks in Gloucester May and June. Howard Liberman in Gloucester, September. 1943 May Four Freedoms Day; October 20 America in the War exhibits 1942-45 FSA absorbed by the Office of War Information (OWI), focus shifts to the domestic impact of WWII 1955 Edward Steichen’s Family of Man exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art includes many of the photos 1962 The Bitter Years 1935-1941: Rural America Seen by Photographers of the FSA Edward Steichen’s last and seminal exhibit as Director of the Museum of Modern Art is dedicated to Stryker and the FSA photographers. As with other FSA themed exhibits, photographs by Gordon Parks– and many other artists–were not included, still aren’t included. 1990/2000s Gees Bend quilts *Roy Stryker on Ruth Goodhue “Ruth Goodhue was the managing editor of “Architectural Forum.” Her father designed the very famous Nebraska capitol, a very unusual building. She was another one on my circuit. But I stopped to have breakfast with her, she was over at that time in the Chrysler Building with the Life complex there and I had breakfast with her and I went up to her office. She was the one that said — I’ll tell you this story because it’s how I reacted so often — “Roy Stryker, I wonder if all towns of 5,000 are alike, because they have the same boiler plate, they have the same radio programs, and so on?” Well, I had to go on a trip and when I got back I had an outline on small towns.” Also: “She was a charming woman and very bright and very proactive. And she said to me, “Are all little towns in America alike because they read the same boiler plate, listen to the same radios on the air, and because they eat the same breakfast food?” Proactive questions, just what I needed. I have a very bad habit of writing memos to myself; I love to put things down, write a page after page and take it home. By the time I got back to Washington, the photographers hadn’t been taking pictures of the little towns they went through. So then there grew an outline — a perfect bombardment of twenty-five pages, I guess. Did you stay overnight? Let’s begin to cover the main street of America, you know, just to see what the heck occurs on it.” **Jane Jacobs As writer and associate editor of The Iron Age, Jane Jacobs published “30,000 Unemployed and 7000 Empty Houses in Scranton, NeglectedCity”, an article which brought attention to her home town. This led to more freelance work and in 1943 a job writing features for the US Office of War Information (OWI). After 1945 and into the 1950s, Jacobs wrote and was editor for the State Department’s magazine branch, primarily for Amerika Illustrated, a Russian language magazine. In the public sector she went on to Architectural Forum. I wonder if Goodhue was a mentor for Jacobs or if they had any overlap. I certainly consider the FSA/OWI files as formative for her ideas — and Goodhue influenced that program. Gloucester connections: Charles Olson In New York City 1937, Charles Olson was hired by the government to work for the American Council of Nationalities Services, an agency that offered support programs for immigrants and refugees. He also wrote for the Office of War Information from 1942 – May of 1944. The timing overlaps with Jane Jacobs somewhat. Gloucester writer, Edward Dahlberg, introduced Olson to Alfred Stieglitz in New York City back in 1937. Goodhue and Cram Ruth Goodhue’s father, Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue, was a famous architect. Through his friendships with Ernest Fenollosa of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and others in the orb of the Boston Society of Arts and Crafts (1897), he met architect Ralph Adams Cram. Goodhue and Cram partnered to form a successful architectural firm, in business together for over twenty years. They had great solo careers, too. Cram designed the Atwood Home, Gallery-on-the-Moors, in East Gloucester, and preliminary plans for the towers on Hammond Sr’s property, and the inspiration or more for Stillington Hall and others. |
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| -Catherine Ryan / all photos Library of Congress, FSA/OWI black and white photography collection | |
| CROSS-COUNTRY CHRONICLE
Catherine Ryan on Gloucester, MA in landmark Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information (FSA/OWI) documentary photographs. Part 1 Hey, Joey, Have a look at Gloucester from this important collection. First up—the Gordon Parks post. 1942. FOBs may recognize some of the faces, names, places. You recently featured the ‘American Gothic’Wallflowers, by this super artist on GMG which reminded me of the road less traveled within this historic collection of photographs archived at the Library of Congress and the New York Public Library. This post is Part 1 in a series on Gloucester images in this legendary FSA/OWI collection. If you are interested in the scope of any Gloucester material from this collection, we know that at least 4 of the FSA/OWI photographers came through Gloucester, MA. No surprise, each photographer took photo(s) of the Fisherman at the Wheel. They also show the impact of WWII. If you can id any of the Gloucesterpeople, please contact me. I’ve listed some known Gloucester names at the end of the post. In 1934 during the Great Depression, Fortune magazine dispatched Margaret Bourke-White to cover the Dust Bowl. She sent additional images to the New Masses and the Nation. In 1935, for one of its many New Deal programs, the US government sent photographers across the country on assignment. Initially their photographs were intended to illustrate the results of the country’s latest efforts to alleviate rural poverty. Ultimately, they created a legendary photographic record of 1935-1945. Here is a jaw-dropping list of established and future notables who Stryker hired for this incredible visual encyclopedia: Esther Bubley, John Collier, Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange, Russell Lee, GordonParks, Marion Post Walcott, Louise Rosskam, Arthur Rothstein, Ben Shahn, George Stoney, John Vachon, and Marion Post Walcott. Stryker also primed an extensive “orbit” of contacts and influence. What is the FSA/OWI collection? (See explanation at the end of this post.) |
| American Photographer GORDON PARKS (1912-2006)
119 FSA/OWI photos for Gloucester, MA, May and June 1942
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| In 2012, the International Center of Photography in New York commemorated the centennial of GordonPark’s birth with a year-long installation featuring 50+ photos (one of the Gloucester ones was in there).
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| Gordon Parks believed the positive reaction he received for some of his early fashion images was his first break (Melva Louis, Joe Louis’ first wife). This support pushed him to set up a photography portrait business in Chicago. He also photographed out in the streets. He was inspired by Norman Alley’s bombing of Panay coverage (1937). FSA/OWI photographer Jack Delano saw his work and urged him to try to enter Stryker’s program via a Rosenwald fellowship. He was 30 when he was brought on board and thrilled to join this famous group. He was the first African American to be hired by Stryker. He worked there less than two years as the program ended. He followed Stryker into a commercial job. Gordon Parks was a man of dazzling talents. His FSA/OWI photos hint at his many future creative pursuits. This work though was rarely seen. |
| You can see Parks skilled portrait photographs: leaders of faith, presidents of universities, people working and at home, such as Mrs. Isabell Lopez of Gloucester, mother of 6 holding her grandchild.
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| There are celebrity portraits: Paul Robeson, Mrs. Roosevelt with Wang Yung, Langston Hughes, and Richard Wright. Portraits and fashion were his bread and butter back in Chicago, before landing a post with this famous group.
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| You can see Gordon Parks the social activist. From left to right: pushing for safer streets, e.g. protection for our kids (devastating streetcar accidents); Jim Crow train FLA; his famous ‘American Gothic’ portrait of Ella Watson who cleaned nights at the FSA government office in Washington, DC. Parks thought this image heavy handed; there is essentially what amounts to a still-photo mini documentary of Ella Watson at home, with her family and at work for more of her story.
Gordon Parks did 1 Gloucester protection/safety photograph, a dangerous crossing.
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You can see Gordon Parks the fashion photographer. Welder on the left is Rosie the Riveter style; and on the right Mrs. Lopez’s daughter, at home Gloucester, MA. The still-lives are Duke Ellington’s colorful ties and one of Jay Thorpe’s Four Freedoms textiles.
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| You can see Gordon Parks the humanist: ordinary big moments with Girls Scouts at a memorial service,Gloucester, MA; New York state camps where kids and staff are made up of diverse backgrounds; AldenCaptain and crew are relaxed, easy company together while in New York.
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| You can glimpse Gordon Parks the musician/composer through the arts he selected to cover while on assignment for the FSA/OWI. Marian Anderson’s broadcast at a mural dedication commemorating her Lincoln Memorial concert. Duke Ellington and the Orchestra at the Hurricane Club Ballroom, in New York City, April 1943.
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| There are also photos of Ellington trying to hear his band; Betty Rocha singing with the Orchestra; and individual portraits of musicians Rex Stewart, Ray Nance, Juan Tizol, Sunny Greer, and Johnny Hodges. The caption for Hodges includes the song title played during his portrait session, “Don’t Get around Much Anymore.” Parks also photographed the Club staff and customers
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| You can see Gordon Parks the movie Director. Some of his FSA/OWI work looks ready for neorealist cinema. (Rome, Open City global 1946.) The image on the left features generations of the women of the Machado/Lopez family. The boys at the Leonard Craske Fisherman at the Wheel memorial are not identified (one close up).
The center mirror image reminds me of film school students and their emulation of Citizen Kane (1941) and other camera tricks. The image in the mirror is from one of Parks early assignments with the FSA. Mirrors and reflections tend toward symbolism anyhow. Parks is there photographing HowardUniversity. It feels like he snapped this on the sly when seen with the other ‘dailies’. It’s Thanksgiving Dinner and President of Howard University, Mordicai Johnson, is being served by an African American.
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| There’s scene shots: movie-scale streets and crowd shots teeming in NYC or downtown Gloucester. Gordon Parks filed 50+ pictures for the Nature of the Enemy show, the second exhibition of the “This is Our War” series of outdoor installations on the promenade of RockefellerCenter, May – July, 1943. ForGloucester, it’s Memorial Day services. |
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| You can see GordonParks the photo journalist and author through the captions he wrote. For the Gloucester FSA/OWI photos there is a complete photo-journalism expose where he tracks a journey from sea to plate that begins in Gloucester and ends up in New York. The collaboration of GMG Gloucester photographers Kathy Chapman and Marty Luster Fish on Fridays series is such an interesting connection.
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| “The mackerel caught off the Gloucester coast ends up on the table of Mrs. Rose Carrendeno, NYC, for Friday’s supper. She prepared and served the fish that she bought earlier that day from Joseph DeMartino’s shop who buys his fish each morning from the Fulton Fish Market. She and her husband have three sons in the armed forces…She stops to chat with Mrs. DeMartino about the ration problems while Joseph DeMartino cleans the mackerel she has purchased.
“Fishermen’s families often make trips down from New England towns to be in New York when the ship arrives. The fishermen consider that nothing is too good for their families.” |
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| Close up of Mrs. Carrendeno’s ingredients for FOB
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| What is the FSA/OWI collection?
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt selected a social economist from ColumbiaUniversity, Rexford Tugwell, as Undersecretary of Agriculture in 1934. One of Tugwell’s policy directives included new analysis of assistance for dislocated farmers. He enticed a protégé, economist Roy E. Stryker, to come with him toWashington to direct the Resettlement Administration’s Historical Section. Stryker was the perfect hire, and successfully eked out the program from 1935-1942. He believed photography would be the key tool. At Columbia, he was a master at amassing visuals and presentations to illustrate economic topics. While a Professor, he insisted his students get out and survey what’s around them, walk “the field”, “see.” The FSA/OWI photographers documented daily life, the effects of the Depression and WWII across the country, the problems our country was facing, Main Streets, landmarks, portraits, workers, communities and families. There is great range of intention, style, subject and theme across the collection. Some of the FSA/OWI photographs received nearly instantaneous and phenomenal fame. The reputation of this work was so respected, so known, that employment in this program would later open doors to grants and commercial jobs, and for several artists, launched long illustrious careers. Stryker promoted and protected these artists and the work as the best art dealers do: fleshing out projects, orchestrating exhibits, doggedly getting their work out there to be seen, and placing it in print– whether for church pamphlets or major media publications, or into galleries and collections. When he moved back to the private sector, he hired them. Unlike the art created for some other WPA-era agencies that was lost or destroyed, Stryker and his team had the foresight to try to protect all of it for perpetuity. At the closure of this program, he sought approval from President Roosevelt to transfer the master collection to the Library of Congress (nearly 280,000 items) as part of our National Archives, which was granted. Throughout the program he shipped boxes of prints to the New York Public Library (41,000 items) so that there would be an additional repository if a safe haven in Washington, DC, did not come together. As a result there have been two outstanding collections to study and access. (Other collections and institutions have smaller holdings of vintage prints.) The Library of Congress remains the primary source for use and research. Through the 1950s, one could check out vintage prints along with books at the NYPL. As with many collections, the same images were often requested over and over. The Library of Congress digitized their FSA/OWI collection in the late 1980s and has been deeply committed to ongoing technological updates. In 2005 the NYPL determined that 1000 photos in their collection were actually “new” discoveries; they put these on line in 2012. There are over 270,000 items in the Library of Congress Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information (FSA/OWI) archives, all digitized. IF you haven’t seen these images in person, look for exhibitions of the true vintage prints. There are many iconic photographs. Some capture a gap between ideals and reality. They have been studied, published and featured many times over. As the Gloucester images show, the collection is not solely images of farmers, rural problems, and Western states. -Catherine Ryan / – all photos Library of Congress, FSA/OWI black and white photography collection |
| To search Gordon Parks FSA/OWI photographs for Gloucester, type in key words
Fishermen on the ALDEN
Gordon Pew Fisheries worker, Joseph Lopez and his family
Search for Gloucester landmarks. There are two or three photos in Rockport: the Pewter Shop and the owner Mrs. Whitney |
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Joey: New for 2013, as Gloucester’s historic fishing industry struggles under tightening Federal regulation. Our traditional Cape Pond Ice logo on a Comfort Colors Khaki T-Shirt features Leonard Crask’s Gloucester Fisherman Statue on the front, with our snowflake serving as ship’s wheel, and the monument’s "They That Go Down To The Sea In Ships" from Psalm 107, Verse 23 on the back, with the dates "1623-2013".
Icons on Icons… Definately a Collector’s Item, right up there with GMG caps… call us, stop by our shop at 104 Commercial Street, the Weathervane on Main Street, or on-line at: www.capepondice.com
