Our Town on the Plains: J.J. Pennell's Photographs of Junction City, Kansas, 1893-1922 Review

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Our Town on the Plains: J.J. Pennell's Photographs of Junction City, Kansas, 1893-1922 ReviewI love books like this that give a peek into bygone lives. Having grown up in Kansas, I found it particularly fascinating as it probably parallels my hometown's development (just different faces and buildings).
Here's an interview with the author from the University of Kansas' "OREAD":
Shortridge said looking at the photographs was similar to reading a novel, providing a detailed look at small-town life during the turn of the century.
"This is an opportunity to get a fairly intimate view of an experience that is in all of our pasts, captured in a very different way," he said.
In order to provide an accurate and in-depth description of the places and events photographed, Shortridge went to the archives of the Junction City Union newspaper.
"You could really make the picture come alive, because you had a newspaper reporter telling you about the context of the photo," he said. "You were able to get that richness that you might not have otherwise had."
Although Pennell captured a wide range of life in Junction City, Shortridge cautions readers about the limits of the collection.
"Pennell was middle class and male, and the world he photographed was biased toward those kinds of people," he said. "There are aspects of the society that didn't get photographed as often."
Shortridge's favorite photograph was taken the year the automobile debuted in Junction City.
"It's a photograph of a 1905 Cadillac all decked out in tissue paper and four people dressed in finery, with smiles on their faces that say all is right with the world," he said. "You get a sense that people felt very much in control of their own destiny."
Our Town on the Plains: J.J. Pennell's Photographs of Junction City, Kansas, 1893-1922 OverviewBy the beginning of the twentieth century, photography had become accessible to average Americans as a means of documenting their lives. Although most people did not yet own cameras, they flocked to commercial photographers for affordable portraits that became the family heirlooms we gape at in wonder today. One of the most accomplished of these photographers was Joseph Judd Pennell of Junction City, Kansas.Pennell had one of the best equipped studios in the state and took thousands of photographs recording the public life of his town. People from all walks of life posed for his camera, and his images not only constitute one of America's great photography collections but also one of the richest visual documentations we have of this era.Our Town on the Plains reproduces more than one hundred of Pennell's best photographs. Taken from 1893 to 1922, these wonderfully crisp images depict life in Junction City and nearby Fort Riley: people posing with studio props or in front of their homes, group shots of schools and clubs, commissioned photographs of buildings and businesses, public events like parades and unveilings, and ordinary people at work on their farms and in their shops.These photographs suggest a world of solid civic and personal values, with Pennell's wide-angle lens lending a sense of spaciousness to everyday life. We see a baseball diamond from the late 1800s and a bar so typical of its day it was used in the opening credits of Cheers, images as inspiring as Teddy Roosevelt on the campaign trail or as nostalgic as storefront windows with groceries or corsets. They also depict a time of major transition in American life, as some people pose with their horse and buggy and others with their automobile.James Shortridge's text, interwoven with Pennell's images, takes readers on a stroll through Junction City in this golden age and points out many of the changes that were sweeping America. An introductory essay by art historian John Pultz reviews Pennell's career during the heyday of studio photography.Pennell's work is widely celebrated, having appeared in numerous books and PBS documentaries. Our Town on the Plains now preserves some of the best of those photographs in a volume through which we can visit our past and, in the process, discover ourselves.This 8-1/2 x 10 inch book contains 146 photographs printed in duotone.

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