Photographic Journeys part 1

Every month, I write a "This Month in History" (TMIH) column, that we send out to interested folks via email.  You can see some of the previous columns by clicking on http://www.capefearmuseum.com/month-history/

I've been writing TMIHs since 2008.  Every TMIH is tied to an artifact or an image in the Museum's collection. This helps me choose a topic, and it showcases the artifacts and images in the collection, giving me a chance to research different stories and time periods. Over the years, I've written about all sorts of things - rationing, shipbuilding, the filming of Firestarter to name just a few.

This month (October 2017), I decided to do things a little differently.  We have this wonderful collection of envelopes of photographs from a now-defunct business, the Camera Shop. They came to the Museum in 2012.  The more than 150 envelopes were found in a building in the city and were unclaimed photos from the 1950s and early 1960s. Most of the envelopes included photographs and negatives. 




Sample of front of envelope, negatives, prints, and back of envelope from Camera Shop Collection, Gift of Michelle Masson

The images provide a wonderful snapshot of an era, and they also provide insight into the daily lives of Wilmingtonians when the city was segregated.



Sampling of images from the Camera Shop Collection, Gift of Michelle Masson

I've been intrigued by the Camera Shop collection since we received it. The images are a mystery and a revelation. I love the emotions you can see in the images, the hints of peoples' personalities, the clothing, the pets, and the mid-century modern drapes, stoves, and furniture. The images help us better imagine life in Wilmington in the 1950s, even though we don't know the names of most of the people in the images. 

So, when I began to think about October's TMIH, I decided to use the images in the collection with envelopes dated "October." I thought I would tell folks about the collection, share the images in the envelopes, and that would be that.

Little did I know that the decision to focus on these photographs would open up an avenue into the history of New Hanover County's Chinese community. 

That journey started with this blurry image of two boys, outsides a brick ranch house.  This was the only print in the envelope that came to us.  

But there were negatives too. So I scanned them, and made what were effectively digital prints. And one of the negatives showed the same two boys as a part of a larger group:

I immediately had questions: who are these people? How do Asian Americans fit into the racially segregated South in the 1950s? Would our understanding of the region's history change if we knew their story?

So I went looking for answers, with the only clue I had - the name on the envelope:

I did what I almost always do when I have questions.....I went to the North Carolina room at the New Hanover County Public Library.   




North Carolina Room at the New Hanover County Public Library, photo courtesy of New Hanover County Public Library

And there, I found some clues to who was in the image.


I first looked in the city directories. For those of you who haven't used one, these are wonderful resources. They were regularly published in cities like Wilmington and they provide a yearly (or biannual) snapshot of the people, businesses, and organizations in town. You can look up a business name, a person's name, and you can look up an address and see who lived at an address (and around it). They - along with the census - are my bread and butter resource for finding out about people.






So, with the name Lee Fon Howard, I  had a place to start.

That said, there was no Lee Fon Howard in Wilmington’s 1960 city directory.  There was, however, a Lee F. Howe, who owned the California Laundry. 

Most Chinese immigrants to the U.S. lived in California in the 19th century, so I wondered if the California Laundry was a Chinese-owned business.  And it was (for more information, see part 2 of this blog post). 

Given the small number of people of Chinese descent in the city, it seems highly probable that the “Lee Fon Howard” on the envelope is really Lee Fon Howe.  


And if that is the case then the children in the picture are Lee Unwah Howe, born in 1950 and Lee Jeanie Mae Howe, born on November 14, 1949.  

The Howe children in the 1968 New Hanover High School yearbook