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Portland Camera Club records

 Collection
Identifier: Coll. 4296

Scope and Content note

This collection documents the activities of the Portland Camera Club and its members. Contents include meeting minutes, correspondence, financial records, promotional material, publications, essays, research, news clippings, scrapbooks, photographic prints, negatives, slides, and glass lantern slides. The collection reflects the founding, governance, management, and programs of the club, as well as the photography of its members.

Dates

  • Creation: 1885 - 2021

Creator

Access

Unrestricted

Copyright

Access to collections at Maine Historical Society is not an authorization to publish. Rights and reproduction requests may be submitted in writing to the MHS Image Services Coordinator or Research & Administrative Librarian, subject to format.

Administrative note

On May 24, 1899, 36 charter members formed the Portland Camera Club (PCC) in Portland, Maine. The club rented its first space at 571½ Congress Street in 1903, and outfitted the rooms with a portrait camera and studio, darkroom, and exhibition space. In 1909, the Portland Society of Art (PSA), a group of professional and amateur artists newly-based in the McClellan-Sweat mansion, invited the PCC to merge with their society. For the next 55 years, PCC was the Photographic Section of the PSA and met on the third floor of the mansion.

In the early years of the club, lantern slides were the favored medium of members. Projected onto a screen, and sometimes hand painted, they could be colorful and luminous. During this period, many members experimented with pictorialism, a technique that emphasized the artistry of photography and was characterized by soft focus, low contrast, and added texture. By the late 1920s, however, the salon print was the preferred format and club members were moving away from pictorialism.

From its inception, the PCC held weekly meetings at which members shared and commented on each other’s work. Regular salons (juried competitions) were held with other regional and national clubs, including those forming the New England Camera Club Council. Salon prints were mailed around the country for exhibits and competitions, amassing stickers on matte backs that tracked the prints’ journeys. In the 1950s, PCC hosted an international salon, a major undertaking for the club. By 1964, the club had amicably dissolved its relationship with the PSA, today’s Portland Museum of Art, and eventually moved to South Portland.

Today, the club remains one of the oldest camera clubs in the United States. Members still meet weekly for much of the year.

Biographical note

The collection highlights the work and contributions of four PCC members.

Francis Orville Libby (1881-1961). A nationally renowned photographer and Maine’s leading pictorialist, Libby was a member of the PCC from 1907 until his death, and club president for a time. A fine arts graduate of Princeton University, he was also a prolific painter. A collection of his prints was held for decades by the PCC; some are now part of the PMA’s collection.

Leyland C. Whipple (1881-1970). Leyland Whipple was a Bangor, Maine, photographer, long-time PCC member, composer, high school band leader, and quality control technician at the Portland Company. In his youth, he was a flautist with the Boston Latin School orchestra and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology mandolin club.

Ethel Wight (1885-1975). The first woman to join the PCC, in 1932, Ethel Wight was an artist and photographer. She studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and worked at the Kahill Photo Studio. In 1934, she opened her own studio, Wight Studio, on Congress Street. In 1927, she photographed Charles Lindbergh with this plane, the Spirit of St. Louis, shortly after his historic transatlantic flight.

Edward T. Richardson (1921-2016). Edward Richardson was a Bowdoin College graduate, attended the University of Paris after serving overseas during WWII, and graduated from Northeastern University Law School in 1950. During his many decades practicing law in Portland, Richardson focused on conservation and served on the boards of various land conservation organizations. A passionate photographer and active PCC member for over 50 years, Richardson served as president, treasurer, and trustee over the years, and was recipient of the club's lifetime achievement award.

Extent

18 Linear Feet (28 boxes + 1 oversize folder)

Language of Materials

English

Arrangement

The collection is arranged in three series.

  • 1. Papers, 1894-2021
  • 2. Publications, 1903-1943
  • 3. Photographs, 1885-2010

Provenance

Gift of the Portland Camera Club, July 16, 2024 (acc. no. 2024.119).

Related Materials

The following publications featuring photographs by PCC members were separated and added to the Brown Library collection:

  • The American annual of photography, 1917, 1920, 1925, 1927, 1931, 1933, 1935, 1938, and 1941
  • Photograms of the year, 1923 and 1924
  • Pictorial photography in America, 1922

Processing note

Club records and papers arrived in bankers’ boxes, photographic prints in large travel cases, and lantern slides in cardboard and wooden custom-made boxes. The papers' original order was retained where evident, though some folders were combined. Records were removed from binders and rehoused in folders. News clippings were photocopied and originals not retained. Research notes compiled by David Kirkwood were, for the most part, separated into Subseries 1.2, though as the keeper of the club’s records for years his notes are peppered throughout.

Matted salon prints and large promotional material were arranged by type and/or photographer and housed in flat boxes. Photographic prints, negatives, and slides were housed together, as were publications collected and maintained by the club. Oversize prints were housed in a shared collections flat file drawer.

Lantern slides were sleeved individually and arranged by subject, whenever identified or apparent. These slides are described at the group level.

A selection of framed items and club artifacts, such as stamps, medals, and a lantern slide projector, were added to the museum collection. These items can be located using the MHS museum catalog.

Title
Guide to the Portland Camera Club records
Status
In Progress
Author
Jordis Rosberg, MHS Archivist, September-November 2024
Date
October 10, 2024
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin

Repository Details

Part of the Maine Historical Society Repository