Between the Covers

Hardcover. Oblong quarto. Measuring 12.5" x 10". Screw bound black leather over paper boards with "Photographs" stamped in gilt on the front board. Contains 595 sepia toned or black and white gelatin silver photographs measuring between 2.5" x 3.5" and 4.5" x 7", many with captions. Very good with wear on the board edges and a detached but present final page with near fine photographs.

An album kept by Maryland native J. Theo Fritz in the early 1900s, showing travel on the East Coast, California, and Cuba. Fritz lived in Baltimore and attended Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, before attending Cornell University. He appears to have come from a family of some means and traveled extensive in the United States, with photos in this album of trips to Pennsylvania, Delaware, Tennessee, South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, and Louisiana, as well as California and Cuba. The images all appear to have been taken between 1899 and 1912.

Fritz was an avid photographer and member of the Baltimore Y.M.C.A. Camera Club who obviously enjoyed the natural beauty of Maryland. He and his family and friends spent a lot of time on the banks of the numerous waterways of Maryland with visits to Gwynns Falls, Gunpowder Falls, and Lake Royer with photos by the water, climbing rock faces, and boating in Royal Oak. There are also shots of various people playing baseball, tennis, and general conviviality, including a wonderful image of a smiling and obviously amused African-American man in a top hat with baseball equipment. A section of 10 photographs shows the city of Baltimore celebrating its Centennial with the city decorated and various buildings lit up.

There are several sections of photos in New York State including New York City, Long Island, Albany, and Ithaca. Fritz attended Cornell University and there are a number of photos showing the university and the town of Ithaca. Fritz captures his dorm room, students studying and practicing the violin, along with his family and friends hiking, fishing, and canoeing. The images from New York City feature the Statue of Liberty, including a close up of her torch, as well as people walking on the then unfinished Williamsburg Bridge and at the newly opened Luna Park amusement park on Coney Island decorated with electric lights. One section has some lovely snapshots of Central Park as well as a boat trip on the Hudson River.

Fritz and company visited Gettysburg, posing with cannons, and camping at Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. Included are images of young men in bathing costumes around their beach house, and of crashing waves on the shore. Fritz also visited Georgia and took photos of the “cotton industry” which included bailing and machinery, as well as photos of African-Americans working in the factories processing the cotton and in a chain gang wearing striped uniforms. The photos also show the Savannah River flood of 1912 with images of people standing on roofs and rowing small boats down city streets; one captures an African-American man carrying a white man on his back to avoid flood waters.

Later sections include a trip to South Carolina with images of an early American aviation field, and a plane in midair. A New Orleans trip shows photos of St. Charles Avenue and Canal Street as well as riverboats on the Mississippi. Near the end Fritz documents a trip to Florida, including Tampa and Key West with a photo of a docked USS *Miami*, before heading to Cuba. There are numerous images of Havana Harbor, the coast, market places, tropical farms, banana groves, a Spanish cemetery, and even a shot of a baseball game being played at U.S. Naval base at Guantanamo Bay.

An interesting assemblage of a young man’s travels throughout the United States seen here through a massive amount of amateur snapshots of better than usual quality.

Item #403373