Our Town…
In 1885, Charles Van Schaick opened a photography studio in his wife’s home town, Black River Falls, Wisconsin, where he served as “town photographer” for the next fifty-seven years. The Wisconsin Historical Society (along with the Jackson County Historical Society) have collected over 5,600 of Van Schaick’s glass plates, and are in the process of moving them to WHS’ web site.
Van Schaick’s photos from 1890-1910 were the basis of Michael Lesy’s 1973 book Wisconsin Death Trip. Readers can find a selection of the portraits and “small town life candids” in the Wisconsin Death Trip Flickr Pool…
More, here.
As we engage our inner Thornton Wilder, we might consider just how far we have– and haven’t– come, as it was on this date in 1859 that Charles Darwin published The Origin of the Species. Actually, on that day he published On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life; the title was shortened to the one we know with the sixth edition in 1872.
