In our current Ben's Lens, Philadelphia photographer James B. Rich has recorded his wife and daughter while on a trip to a popular New York State tourist destination. Does anyone recognize the location?

Sarah J. Weatherwax
Curator of Prints and Photographs

 

 

Thanks to all of you who kindly offered suggestions about our recent Ben's Lens. Although the nature of the scene remains a mystery overall, some deductions have been made. The large building in the background is not a mill according to one of our readers who is an expert in the field. Other readers suggested that the men wearing non-Western clothing might be Chinese railroad workers, or perhaps were foreign workers employed to help with construction at the Centennial exhibition.

Still another reader suggested that the non-Western clothing might be Zouave uniforms used by some regiments during the Civil War. Knowing that photographer Frederick Gutekunst had travelled to Gettysburg to photograph the area only three weeks after the battle, I contacted historians with the National Park Service at Gettysburg to weigh in on our perplexing photograph. They all agreed that the building depicted was not in the Gettysburg area and also that the Zouave uniforms looked more European than American. Since Gutekunst is known to have traveled to Germany in 1878, it is possible that this image documents a European scene. Click Image for Larger View.

We still don't have an answer to our Ben's Lens question, but we have raised many tantalizing possibilities!

Thank you to:

David Long
Theodore Hazen
John Heiser
Tom Keels
Herb Lapp
Glenys Waldman