Early 1900s Call Album - page 60

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Sometime in about 1904, someone in my grandmother Evelyn Clara Call's (1895-1962) family started taking photographs and placing them in an album. My grandmother was nine in 1904, so she could have been the photographer. Or it could have been one of her parents Charles Joslin Call (1859-1939) or Elizabeth Ann (Coe) Call (1861-1956). Most of the early photographs are of family gatherings and places someone visited. I believe by about 1911, my grandmother was taking the photographs. There are photos of her classmates at Batavia High School and groups of teenage girls. 

The Call family live in Stafford, Genesee County, New York. They had a cottage at Silver Lake in Wyoming County. So many of the photos were taken in these locations.

Photos on this page date from 1913. 



The first three photos on the page look to be photos from some sort of historical play or event based on the costuming and that there are at least two people in blackface makeup. 

Blackface makeup is a style of theatrical makeup used to caricature black people. It developed in theaters in Europe, and then  became more popular in  the nineteenth century in the United States, with the growth of minstrel shows. A few years after this photo was taken, actors in blackface makeup portrayed criminals in Birth of A Nation. 

Since the context of these photos being taken, and why the people were in blackface makeup is not known, nothing should be implied about the motives of the people in the photo. All we know is that there are two people wearing blackface makeup in group photos that include people in what could be colonial and early American costumes. 

If you'd like to learn more about blackface, and how it is viewed today, visit 

A Brief History of Blackface (and Its Legacy) at thecollector.com and How the History of Blackface is Rooted in Racism at History.com 





The remaining photos look to be from a trip to the Hudson River. 


This is likely a photograph of the Paddle Steamer Robert S. Fulton, owned by Hudson River Day Line, that offered luxury day trips on the Hudson River beginning in 1909. 


Hudson River at Catskill 

Hudson River at Kingston Point


Evelyn Clara Call is on the left 

Evelyn Clara Call, daughter of Charles Joslin Call (1859-1939) and Elizabeth Ann Coe (1862-1956) was born 12 February 1895 in Wichita, Sedgwick County, Kansas. She married Francis William Hankins (1897 - 1983) on 31 December 1920 in Stafford. She died on 10 June 1962 in Philadelphia, Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania.

All photos on this page have been digitally enhanced.

About the Early 1900s Call Album 

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