Main Street Daytona, More Than a Century Ago

A circa 1895 cyanotype of Main Street Daytona
(photograph courtesy Paul Jones)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Photographs from the Florida State Archives:

Underwater Thanksgiving at Rainbow Springs (1953)

Governor Collins' daughter Darby with Thanksgiving turkey at mansion (1959)

Old Horse Racing Photos

Borrowing an idea from Railbird, I looked through the Florida Photographic Archives for old racing photos. Some highlights:

• color postcard of Gulfstream's paddock before the renovations
• a 1939 Marion Post Wolcott photo of the Hialeah toteboard (love the bugler in the lower left corner)
• Really Rugged (sire of Rugged Lark) sold as a two-year-old for $32,000 at a 1962 auction at Hialeah ractrack
• 1932 photograph of the starting line at Hialeah, using a barrier rather than starting gates. The Totalisator in the background was the first used in the United States.
• 1960s/1970s (based on the boots) photograph of a woman bugler calling the horses to the post at a Miami racetrack

Lewis Hine in Florida

Recent articles in the Tampa Tribune feature one of the photographs taken by Lewis Hine for the National Child Labor Committee. This 1913 portrait of a newsboy in Ybor City is one of many such images that elicited support for child labor laws in this country. Recently, Joe Manning has been tracing the stories and identities of the children Hine photographed, and this fall the Tampa Tribune published a story about Manning's search to find the newsboy ("Photos Expose Child Labor in Tampa," October 21, 2007). Tampa historians traced small clues, and found that the boy is probably Tony Valenti, son of Sicilian immigrants, who grew up to be a successul businessman ("Everybody Turns Out To Be Something," Tampa Tribune, December 8, 2007).

To see the National Child Labor Committee photographs from Tampa, visit http://lcweb2.loc.gov/pp/nclcquery.html and type "Tampa" in the search box. Or type "Florida" to see Hine's photographs from Jacksonville and Apalachicola as well.

Florida Showcase

A new exhibit opened yesterday at the Florida Museum of Photographic Arts. Florida Showcase includes images by Clyde Butcher, Connie Bransilver, John Moran, Jeff Ripple, James Shadle, James Valentine, Carlton Ward, Jr., and Eric Zamora. The common thread -- Florida's natural environment. The exhibit will be up at the museum in downtown Tampa through September 8, 2007.

Architectural Photography Contest

The American Institute of Architects- Tampa Bay Chapter has announced an Architecutral Photography competition featuring man-made structures in west-central Florida.

-- Photographs must be of structures within the chapter's boundaries (Hillsborough, Pinellas, Polk, Pasco, Citrus, Sumter, and Hernando counties)

-- Open only to amateur photographers

-- A jury to select winners ($1,000 grand prize, $300 second, $200 third)

-- Top 15 photographs to be included in a 2008 calendar

-- Entries due September 7, 2007.

See www.aiatampabay.com for more details.