Our first Sepia Saturday call of 2022 features a picture postcard from the 1940s of Main Street in the town of Camden in, appropriately enough, Maine in the USA. The image - like all the call images for January 2022 - comes from the Flickr Commons collection of the Camden Public Library. Our thanks go to them for sharing their collection of old images with the world. If you would like to share an old image with the rest of the world, Sepia Saturday is the place to do it. Simply post the image and then add a link to the list below - on or around Saturday 1st January 2022.
Sepia Saturday is 600! We celebrate the occasion with a celebration of photographers; and a photograph of the Australian, Sam Hood, whose photographs have graced many a Sepia Saturday theme image over the years.
Once again, it's time to call for your submissions to Sepia Saturday. All you have to do is to share an old photograph of your choice on or around Saturday 9th October 2021, and add a link to the list below. My submission this week is of an unknown lady, striding purposely into the future. Little does she realise that there is a lawn roller coming up behind her ready to flatten all her dreams! Such is life.
This week I am featuring a photograph of a couple sat on the running board of a car. They smile and look happy: maybe they are on their holidays or going for a day out at the seaside. I have no idea who they are, but that doesn't matter; they are universal tokens of the very essence of family photographs - happy memories that will last forever. The cars may change, as do the fashions, but that desire to capture a moment of happiness was there eighty years ago when this photograph was taken, and it is still there today on countless smartphone selfies. Sepia Saturday provides an opportunity for us to share such family memories, and you are invited to share yours by adding a link to the list below, on or around Saturday 2 October 2021.
Here we go - a new chapter for Sepia Saturday: not so much a theme image, more an invitation to take part. Share your old photographs with other enthusiasts by featuring them in a post and linking the post to the list below, on or around Saturday 25th September 2021.
So, here we are, at the end of the alphabet: we are in a covered bridge going to who knows where. Behind us is the past, in front of us is the future. Most philosophers and newspaper agony aunts would tell us, in no uncertain words, that we must look to the future: forget the past, tomorrow is a new day. But here, on Sepia Saturday, we do exactly the opposite: for a brief moment let us forget the future and all that it has in store for us, and turn to the past. Here on Sepia Saturday we have been turning to the past for over a decade and we will continue to do so. So, for the final theme in our archive alphabet series, all you need to do is to turn to the past with your choice of old photograph, post it in a post on or around Saturday 18th September, and add a link to the list below.
Here on Sepia Saturday we have, at times, had themes; and at other times just invited people to share their favourite old photographs. For the next month or so, we are going to do the latter and have what we used to call "open themes". I will still feature an image on the weekly call post, so if you really do want themes, you can always try and match that. Let's see how it goes. Here's a preview of next week's call image:-
Who would have ever thought it when we started this alphabetical tour of old photograph archives that we would get around to the letter W and have XYZ waiting around the corner? But there again, who would have thought twelve years ago that Sepia Saturday would reach Week 587 and still be going? Granted, the numbers have fallen off - back in those early days we were getting 30+ contributors every week - but it has never been about numbers. I have a feeling that Sepia Saturday will keep strolling along - never in a hurry, never taking itself too seriously - until my blogging days are over, when hopefully someone else might take the role on. Do we need a revamp? Probably. Do we need to connect more enthusiastically to social media in all its' manifestations? More than likely. Will we manage it in the future? Probably not! That's the nature of the Sepia Saturday beast, and that is how it will keep moving along - at a slow but steady pace with plenty of stops to small the sepia roses. Sepia Saturday 587 has a picture of someone playing patience: individualistic, contemplative, satisfying .... all the things Sepia Saturday tries to be. If you want to join in, join in with an old photograph and a few words on or around Saturday 11 September 2021, and add a link to the list below.
Here is the last of the alphabetical themes - what follows that? Stick around and find out!
For Sepia Saturday 586, our theme image comes from the Library of Virginia and features a page from an old photograph album. For those wanting to follow a theme, here is your chance to turn the spotlight on the pages for a change, instead of the individual photographs. It might be the layout, it might be the captions, it might be the selection of photographs .... or it might be something else entirely. It might be V for vintage or vegetables or very special photographs. Whatever it is, share your old photo on or around Saturday 4th September 2021 and add a link to the list below. And here are a reminder of the final two stops on our alphabet tour of the archives.
I must ask for your Understanding. I Underestimated the amount of time left before I needed to put Up the Sepia Saturday prompt image. Under the circumstances, I will Undertake to be on time in future - Unless, of course, I forget again. Oh, and by the way, we have reached the letter U in our tour through the archives. U know the routine by now - post your post on or around Saturday 28th August and add a link to the list below. Here is the rest of the alphabet:-
Our Sepia Saturday archive tour has reached the letter T, and where better to stop for tea that with the President of Turkey who has agreed to show us around his archives. With the continuing travel restrictions due to the COVID pandemic, we are, of course, having to do this virtually, and with the help of the Flickr Commons initiative. For our theme image we have chosen a 1930s photograph of a movie screening in the Turkish village of Ballikpinar. This illustrates the power of images - both still images and moving images - to transcend history. In choosing your submission you can transcend history, have a cup of tea, watch a movie, or do almost anything you want to. Just post a post on or around Saturday 21 August 2021 and add a link to the list below. The alphabet is running out, here are the final group of archives stops:-
Busy street, busy times, people out on the streets, mixing together : well, we can dream can't we! This week our Sepia Saturday Archive A-Z has reached the letter S and we are calling in on the archives of the Salt Research Institute. You can take from the prompt what you will - there are enough potential themes there to keep everyone busy. All you need to do is to choose you theme, choose your photo, post your post, and add a link to the list below on or around Saturday 14th August. And look who has been busy - here are the rest of the prompts in this Sepia Saturday sequence. After we get to the letter Z what happens - wait and see ... it's time for some changes.
Our tour of the archives has taken us to the letter R, and R stands for Riksarkivet - the National Archives of Norway. By a happy coincidence, R also stands for the Rolling Stones, and it is a picture from a Rolling Stones concert that provides us with our theme image this week. Once again it is time to get out your old images, paint them black and white (or sepia), get all the satisfaction you want, and climb onto this sepia cloud of mine. You can go with the stones, go with the r's or go in any direction you want, just post your post on or around Saturday 7th August and add a link to the list below. And here is next week's prompt - T,U,V, W and XYZ will follow shortly.
Here we are at letter Q, and equally here we are at the seaside in Southport. For me, Southport means the seaside town just north of Liverpool, but I am well aware that I might equally be in the USA or South Africa or Australia. The Southport featured in our theme image this week is the town of Southport in Queensland, Australia. In addition to the potential theme of south ports, war memorials, palm trees and field guns, you could also try anything that starts with the letter Q. Or, there again, you could just post any old photo you please on or around Saturday 31st July 2021 and add a link to the list below. And where else could you possibly go to after Southport other than to a Rolling Stones concert in Norway. You can always find variety on Sepia Saturday!
Our Sepia Saturday images usually remind us of times gone by, times that have fallen out of fashion, times when values were different to those we have now. This week's Sepia Saturday theme image is no exception to this rule, but it is not the rather splendid picture of the actress Marlene Dietrich that is illustrative of a different age, but the fact that it appeared on a picture card to be found within a packet of cigarettes. I can remember collecting cigarette cards as a child, anxiously awaiting my father buying a new packet to see what delight I would find inside. I could even mimic the habits of adults by stopping at the seat shop on my way to school and buying a packet of sweet cigarettes, and such packets equally has picture cards inside.
Such picture cards today remind us that the "good old days" were sometimes the rather silly old days. Photographs are never silly, however, so we ask you to look out whatever old photograph comes to mind when you see this week's theme image. Include it in a post and post your post on or around Saturday 24th July 2021 and add a link to the list below. And here is a list of what is around the Sepia Saturday corner:-
What more could you want from a Sepia Saturday prompt? Everybody must have a photograph of people playing ukuleles in their family archives or collections of old photographs! If not, there is always Elvis Presley (it doesn't even look like him!) or the very rare sight of lawyers having a laugh! Whatever you can come up with in response to this week's prompt, come up with it on or around Saturday 17th July 2021 and add a link to the list below. And after a week of Elvis Presley and ukuleles, where are we going next week? To Marlene Dietrich and cigarette packets - where else?
We are on a tour of photographic archives and the letter N takes us to the National Library of Norway. From their collection (available via their Flickr Commons stream) I have chosen this rather good portrait of Grace Holst. Who was Grace Holst, I can hear you all saying, and what was her relationship with the famed Gustav of the Planet Suit fame? The answer is, I don't really know, and other than the fact that she was a Norwegian-American soprano, I can find no information about her. So, if you are looking for a theme this week, it could be pictures of unknown people. We all have these amongst our collections of family photographs - they may be cousin Ethel, or Uncle Walters' "friend", or they may be a semi-famous Norwegian-American soprano. You don't need to follow that theme suggestions - there are always fur coats, strings of pearls and the inevitable hat. Whatever you follow - or ignore - just post your posts on or around Saturday 10th July and add a link to the list below. And whilst you whistle a happy tune, take a look at what is coming up.
