Young man in a railroad photo studio in Moline, Ill.
Click here to view it larger.
Click here to view the back.
What it is:
Cabinet card measuring 4.25 x 6.5 inches.
What I know about it:
Photographer is Atkinson (probably C. W. Atkinson), located at that time in Moline, Illinois. Otherwise undated and unidentified.
Comments:
My friend Allen is an avid collector of things in a variety of categories, so it’s no surprise that he would acquire some vintage photographs along the way. The surprise came last week when we got together to see a show and he gave me an envelope containing a bunch of his old photos! Here’s the first one. It looks like a rather conventional photo studio setting of the day, but the back reveals it was taken in a photo studio on a railroad car. Atkinon’s Mammoth Railroad Car, to be precise, located at that point in Moline, Illinois, though the very nature of the studio allowed him to be a traveling photographer. I’ve posted one other photograph that I know to be from a railroad studio. You can see it here, along with some more information about railroad car photo studios in general. As for this photographer, I didn’t find much about him, though I did find a couple other examples of what appear to be his work, including one with an identical setting found here on a Swedish genealogical website. I’ll post more of Allen’s photos soon, though they are all young men, so I’ll alternate them with others for variety. By the way, Allen assures me they are all his ex-lovers. 🙂
Pics of Then 
How interesting! It amuses me that clearly this young man carefully dressed and fixed his hair, but there’s still a bit of hair sticking up on his right side.
As someone whose hair tends to do whatever it wants, I can sympathize.
I have a photo in the same Atkinson railway studio , same background in Moline of a potential unknown relative
Except he’s deceased , standing with the help of a mechanical contraption sold back then specifically to take these type of photos
Oh, that’s great! I’d love to see if it there’s a way for you to share it. I’m always fascinated to find different photos by the same photographer, especially when they use the same setting. I’m also fascinated by the idea of a photographer traveling around in a railway car, and I wonder about the various people who go to him for photos.
This is a great poost thanks
Thank you!