Bitter, Karl Theodore Francis, 1867-1915 Search this
Container:
Box 1, Folder 1
Type:
Archival materials
Date:
circa 1927
Collection Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Collection Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
Collection Citation:
Karl Theodore Francis Bitter papers, 1887-circa 1977. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the processing and digitization of this collection was provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art.
The Farber collection documents images of celebrated American buildings by photographer Joseph C. Farber.
Scope and Contents note:
The Farber collection is filled with well-crafted and often very beautiful images of celebrated American buildings. Many of the images, which for the most part take the form of 11" x 14" black-and-white photoprints, explore the European Renaissance origins of American architecture. The collection is also very rich in color transparencies. Nearly all the images are directly related to published projects, specifically photo-essays in the shape of articles , many of which appeared in the magazine Antiques or newspapers. Farber probably would have wished for all of his photographs to have been published. Many were shown in exhibitions, as evidenced by the large proportion of the photoprints that are mounted and also the existence of correspondence files relating to such matters. There are also files related to the processes of conceiving, executing, and publishing his photographic work.
The images for the books are nearly all black-and-white, whereas magazine work, especially the commissions from Antiques, generated the most transparencies. In addition to the images in print and transparency form, and the associated proof sheets and negatives, there is also a great quantity of slides related to travel in the collection, which predate Farber's second career as a professional photographer. A tiny sampling of earlier photographs, mostly with artistic or family-and-personal themes, is also included.
Black-and-white negatives, black-and-white prints, and color transparencies, mostly created for specific book projects, articles in Antiques magazine, etc. Generally, color was used for magazine articles, while black-and-white images were intended for books. Collection also includes photographs of personal or family significance, and some early artistic efforts. Non-pictorial portion consists primarily of material related to Farber's publications: correspondence, galley proofs, reviews, etc.
Photographs include projects related to Thomas Jefferson (e.g., Monticello), classical architecture, Essex, Connecticut, etc. Buildings photographed include Raleigh's Tavern, Williamsburg, Va.; Independence Hall, Philadelphia; Maison Carree, Nimes, France; St. Paul's Chapel, Boston, Mass.; White House, Washington; New York City landmarks; sites in Springfield and New Salem, Ill., associated with Abraham Lincoln; historic buildings in Boston and Cambridge,Mass.; Hannibal, Mo.; Deerfield, Mass.; New England churches and meetinghouses; and buildings and objects from ancient Greece, which were published with excerpts from Herodotus' History of the Pelopponesian Wars (Farber called this group of images "Herodotus"); and Italian villas designed by Andrea Palladio, such as the Villa Rotunda. Some pictures relating to themes of democracy were inspired by the U.S. Bicentennial celebration.
Arrangement:
Divided into five series.
Series 1: Photographs
Series 2: Photonegatives and Contact Sheets
Series 3: Textual Materials
Series 4: Color Slides and Transparencies
Series 5: Books
Biographical/Historical note:
Born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1902, Joseph C. Farber he attended the New York Military Academy, and later Columbia College, where his formal studies included chemistry and art composition. While these were excellent preparation for subsequent employment in the family business, Friedman Blau Farber, Manufacturers of Knitted Outerwear, at Columbia he discovered the true love of his life, the art and craft of photography. He became involved in the New York Camera Club. For the rest of his life he would consider himself a protégé of the Club's resident guru, famed photographer Edward Steichen. Farber's work was first shown in the Fifth Annual Exhibition of Work by Cleveland Artists and Craftsmen at the Cleveland Museum of Art in late spring 1923, and he taught photography to summer campers. Later, throughout 39 years of employment in the garment business, he continued to enjoy and practice photography, especially in making portraits of good friends. He married Caroline Feiss, also a Cleveland native and a promising watercolor artist. In 1939 the Farber's moved to New York.
According to his daughter, Dr. Joan Farber, her father purchased a large format Linhof field camera during a 1958 visit with his son Thomas in Germany. The Linhof camera front can be shifted to provide corrections for architectural photography which are not possible with smaller cameras. After Joan headed to college the Farbers had time for increased travel. They were accompanied by their daughter on a trip to Greece in summer 1960 which included photographs of herself, an attractive, sophisticated college coed, stylishly dressed and coifed for the occasion, posed on the steps of the Parthenon. A trip to Spain the following year resulted in many dozens of 35mm color images, part of a large group of travel slides.
This was also the period in Farber's life that a whirlwind round-the-world trip was undertaken, with visits to Thailand, Japan, Hong Kong, Hawaii, and California. By the end of the next year, the Farbers were renting as a vacation home a converted button factory in Essex, Connecticut, a former shipbuilding town on the Connecticut River, as a vacation home. Within months Farber had retired from his design and executive responsibilities at the Campus Sweater and Sportswear Company in Manhattan to live for a year in Essex. There were also trips more abroad, particularly to Greece and Egypt, while the Farbers continued to maintain an apartment in New York. Climbing a mountain in Greece in summer 1967, Farber suffered a heart attack, from which he fully recovered.
In 1969 his new career was launched by the publication of Portrait of Essex by Barre Publishers. Local historian Marie Moore supplied the text to accompany Farber's evocative photographs of the ships, shops, shores, streets, and historic structures of this seafaring town. His brother-in-law Carl Feiss, F.A.I.A., furnished the Introduction.
In 1971, Farber and Wendell Garrett published his first Jefferson book, The Worlds of Thomas Jefferson followed by their second, Thomas Jefferson Redivivus Garrett, who edited the Adams Papers wrote the text, with the help of excerpts from the writings of Jefferson himself. The following summer one of Farber's Monticello views was featured on the cover of Antiques. In 1973 Farber was credited with three covers and a frontispiece for the magazine, as well as three photographic essays. The subjects ranged from Sculpture at the Boston Atheneum to The Villas of Andrea Palladio to The Architecture of Lavius Fillmore Garrett introduced Farber to Lincoln scholar Harold Holzer who hired Farber as photographer to help illustrate his Prints of Abraham Lincoln, which appeared in the annual presidents' birthday number of Antiques the next year, February 1974. Some Contemporary Paintings of Abraham Lincoln appeared twelve months later. Three more Lincoln-themed articles appeared in February issues of Antiques in 1978, 1979, and 1980: Sculptures of Abraham Lincoln From Life, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, and Here Lincoln Lived: New Salem and Springfield, Illinois.
Two more books of Farber's photographs were published in 1975. Democracy's First Struggle was an account of the Peloponnesian Wars in the words of Herodotus, as edited from the Aubrey de Selincourt with translation by Farber. The photographic images dated back to the family trips to Greece in the early 1960s. Native Americans: 500 Years After was published by Thomas J. Crowell in 1975 with text by Michael Dorris. Following Native Americans came a series of exhibitions of photographs from the book including shows at the National Museum of Natural History (Smithsonian Institution), Dartmouth College, and the Cleveland Museum of Natural History .
Also in the mid -1970s a cover story in Antiques entitled "The Architectural Heritage of New York City" led to an exhibition at the Abigail Adams Smith House. In the late '70s two more exhibitions were staged, featuring scenes of local color at the dedication of the East Haddam (Connecticut) Historical Society in the summer of 1979 and showing buildings by Palladio at the Cooper-Hewitt Museum (New York City.)
In 1980 Farber's interior view of a basilica, Palladio's Redentore church in Venice, was featured on the cover of Antiques. The photographs became the subject of a book, Palladio's Architecture and Its Influence authored by architectural historian, Henry Hope Reed.
Harold Holzer organized many joint photographic trips revolving around Holzer's career in the public relations department of Channel 13, New York's public television station. Each summer for four years in succession they set off to diverse spots to make publicity shoots for upcoming special programming. First was Missouri to photograph Mark Twain sites for a dramatization of "Life Along the Mississippi". The next summer they headed to the Berkshires to document The Mount, the home of Edith Wharton in Lenox, Massachusetts, around whose life and work a mini-series in three parts was planned. The summer trip of 1982 was a return visit to Massachusetts to photograph The Street, Deerfield's historic thoroughfare, combined with a side trip across the border to the Robert Todd Lincoln home, Hildene, in Manchester, Vermont.
In 1982 Farber was commissioned by Architectural Digest magazine to photograph the Mark Twain residence in Hartford. Farber and Holzer succeeded in the early to mid-1980s in getting Farber's out-takes from their Channel 13 trips published together with his carefully worded scripts in such periodicals as American History Illustrated and in Antiques & The Arts Weekly. Many of Farber's pictures were printed in articles in Antique Trader, to which Holzer was a regular contributor. In 1983, when Farber turned 80, his color images of the interior spaces of the Metropolitan Club of New York were published in a book by the same name, written by Paul Porzelt. In his travels in the last decade of his life he was often accompanied by family friend Ethel Phillips, including a tour of Great Britain in the summer of 1987. With Mrs. Phillips he at one time had contemplated publishing a book on the historic mansions of the Hudson River. Two other unrealized projects, upon his death in 1994 at the age of 91, were books on the classical architecture of New York City and on the history and daily lives of Hispanic Americans in the United States.
Biographical Time Line:
Biographical Time Line for Joseph C. Farber
Biographical Time Line
1903 -- Born Cleveland, Ohio
1910s -- At New York Military Academy
1920s -- At Columbia College, studying chemistry, art composition; studies photography with Edward Steichen in Camera Club; teaches photography as camp counselor
1923 -- Participates in Fifth Annual Exhibition of Work by Cleveland Artists and Craftsmen at Cleveland Museum of Art (May 1-June 3)
1926 -- Takes job as "salesman and experimental worker" at Friedman Blau Farber, Mfg. Knitted Outerwear," Cleveland; Marriage to Caroline Feiss, Cleveland native and watercolor artist
1933 -- Son Thomas Feiss born at Cleveland
1936 -- Daughter Joan born
1930s -- Family moves to New York
1958 -- Visit to son in Germany; purchase of Linhof camera; daughter off to college
1960 -- Trip to Greece, daughter along
1961 -- To Spain
1963 -- Death of son in mountaineering accident; to Thailand, Japan, Hong Kong, Hawaii, California
1964 -- Rents former button factory in Essex, Connecticut as vacation home
1965 -- Retirement from Campus Sweater & Sportswear Company; Living in Essex
1966 -- To Greece
1967 -- To Egypt and Greece; heart attack ; Essex (summer?)
1969 -- Portrait of Essex published, text by Marie Moore; into by Carl Feiss, AIA (Barre)
1970 -- Trip to Bermuda
1971 -- Thomas Jefferson Redivus published, text by Wendell Garrett, Editor of The Magazine Antiques (Barre); Farber introduced to "Jefferson circle"; Vacations in Essex and Florida
1972 -- Monticello images published in Antiques
1973 -- Photographs of sculpture at the Boston Atheneum, the Maison Carree at Nimes (France): the villas of Andrea Palladio in Vicenza and environs (Italy) and the architecture of Lavius Fillmore (Connecticut and Vermont) published in Antiques
1974 -- Images of Abraham Lincoln prints published in Antiques: accompanying article is by Lincoln scholar Harold Holzer; beginning of ten-year collaboration
1975 -- Photographs of Lincoln portraits in Antiques, Holzer text Democracy's First Struggle published, based on Herodotus' Histories of Greece (Crown); Native Americans: 500 Years Afterpublished (Thomas Crowell)
1976 -- Exhibitions of photographs of Native Americans at National Museum of Natural History, Dartmouth College, and Cleveland Museum of Natural History; Images of historic New York City buildings in Antiques, text by Elizabeth Donaghty Garrett; Exhibition of photographs of New York City landmarks at Abigail Adams House, New York City.
1978 -- Photographs of Lincoln sculptures, with Holzer, in Antiques
1979 -- Images of Lincoln and George Washington, sculpture of John Rogers, and sculpture of U.S. Capitol published in Antiques, with Holzer; Exhibition of photographs at East Haddam Historical Society; Exhibition of Palladio photographs at Cooper Hewitt Museum, New York City.
1980 -- Palladio's Architecture and Its Influence published, with Henry Hope Reed (Dover) ; Venice image (church interior) published on Antiques cover; Death of wife; "Caroline Fund" established at Cooper Union; Teaches photography in local high school; To Missouri with Holzer to photograph Mark Twain sites for Channel 13
1981 -- Images of Lincoln sites published in black and white in Antiques with Holzer (should have been in color); Summer trip to Berkshires with Holzer to photograph Edith Wharton home
1982 -- Commissioned to photograph Mark Twain house in Hartford for Architectural Digest; Images of The Mount, Edith Wharton's home in Lenox, Mass., published in American History Illustrated with Holzer; Summer trip to Massachusetts and Vermont with Holzer to photograph "The Street," Deerfield (Channel 13) and Hildene, Robert Todd Lincoln home in Manchester
1983 -- Images of Mark Twain sites in Hannibal, Missouri published in American History Illustrated with Holzer; Summer trip to Harpers Ferry, West Virginia with Holzer (Channel 13); Harper's Ferry images published in Antique Trader with Holzer Deerfield, Massachusetts images published in Antiques & The Arts Weekly with Holzer; The Metropolitan Club of New York published, with Paul Porzelt (Rizzoli)
1984 -- Images of Hildene published in Antique Traderwith Holzer
1985 -- Images of Rebecca Nurse Homestead, Old Salem, Massachusetts published in Antique Traderwith Holzer
1987 -- Tour of Great Britain with Ethel Phillips (summer?)
1994 -- Died, New York City, New York
Related Archival Materials:
Other Materials at the Smithsonian Institution
National Anthropological Archives, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution
Joseph C. Farber photographs of American Indian life, circa 1970-1975
Photographs made as part of Joseph C. Farber's project to document modern American Indian everyday life. Represented tribes include the Acoma, Apache, Blackfoot, Chehalis, Cherokee, Cheyenne, Chippewa, Cocopa, Dakota, Eskimo, Haida, Kiowa, Kutenai, Lummi, Mohave, Mohawk, Navaho, Northern Athabascan, Onandaga, Pima, Pueblo, Quinalt, Seminole, Taos, Tlingit, and Zuni. Subject coverage is broad and varies from tribe to tribe. Included are portraits, as well as totem poles, carving, weaving, pottery, painitng, landscapes, boats and canoes, ceremonial regalia, camps, classes and vocational training, homes and traditional dwellings, construction projects, rodeos and powwows, dances, industries (including lumber), herding and ranching, agriculture, stores and storefronts, cliff dwellings, parades, crab cleaning, fishing, games, health care, legal processes, music, office work, sewing, vending, and a funeral. There are also photographs of R. C. Gorman (and a letter from Gorman to Farber) and Fritz Shoulder (some in color).
Provenance:
Collection donated by Dr. Joan Farber, 1994.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Photographs published in Joseph C. Farber's books are still under copyright. Reproduction permission from the Joseph C. Farber's estate is required. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Smithsonian Institution. Anacostia Community Museum Search this
Extent:
2 Video recordings (AV000962, AV003327, open reel, 1 inch)
1 Video recording (AV002642, VHS)
3 Sound recordings (AV002679, AV003345, AV003421, open reel, 1/4 inch)
1 Sound recording (AV003336, cartridge, 1/4 inch)
Type:
Archival materials
Video recordings
Sound recordings
Documentary films
Place:
United States
Date:
1994, c1987
Scope and Contents:
This short documentary provides an overview of the development of church music alongside the growth of African American churches in the eastern United States from the arrival of black Africans in Jamestown in 1619 through 1877 and the Reconstruction era. The evolution of church music within African American churches included the formation of music programs and performances, hymnals, choirs, negro spirituals, and music education as well as the addition of organs to accompany the singing of psalms, hymns, and anthems. During the Great Awakening of the 1730s and 1740s, the Christianization of slaves and Africanization of Protestant hymns swept through the American colonies. European Christianity and the emotionalism of the African homeland were combined during the Second Awakening, which began in the late eighteenth century and lasted until the middle of the nineteenth century. The history of church music created by urban and rural congregations within New England and Southern states is explored.
Short documentary. Part of Climbing Jacob's Ladder Audiovisual Records. Complete production: AV000962, AV003327. Production elements: AV002679 [narration], AV003345 [outtakes - sound], AV003421 [music], AV003336 [music]. AV003421: 6 songs including We Are Climbing Jacob's Ladder [also known as Jacob's Ladder] and Battle Hymn of the Republic [also known as Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!]. AV003336: 2 recordings of We Are Climbing Jacob's Ladder. Dated 19940923 [AV000962]. Undated [all other recordings].
Biographical / Historical:
Church Songs of Black Americans 1740 - 1877 was created alongside the Climbing Jacob's Ladder: The Rise of Black Churches in Eastern American Cities, 1740 - 1877 exhibition which explored the growth and central role of African American churches during the 18th- and 19th-centuries in the eastern United States: Boston, Savannah, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, and Richmond. The exhibition was organized by the Anacostia Museum and held there from October 1987 to October 1988.
Local Numbers:
ACMA AV003327
ACMA AV002679
ACMA AV003345
ACMA AV003421
ACMA AV003336
ACMA AV002642
General:
Title transcribed from opening credits of video recording.
Series Restrictions:
Use of the materials requires an appointment. Some items are not accessible due to obsolete format and playback machinery restrictions. Please contact the archivist at ACMarchives@si.edu.
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Kaslov, Steve, ca. 1888-1949 (King of the Red Bandanna Romany Gypsies ) Search this
Extent:
4.3 Cubic feet (15 boxes)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Photographs
Journals
Dissertations
Scrapbooks
Manuscripts
Place:
West Virginia -- 1930-1950
New Jersey -- 1930-1950
Maspeth (Queens, Long Island, N.Y.) -- 1930-1950
New York (N.Y.) -- photographs -- 1930-1950
Date:
circa 1920-1975
Scope and Contents:
This collection consists of 4.3 cubic feet of manuscript, print, and photographic materials created or collected by Carl de Wendler-Funaro (1898-1985) in pursuit of his interest in Gypsy life and culture. (Carlos de Wendler-Funaro used several forms of his name; he wrote mostly as Carl de Wendler-Funaro.) The -collection was brought to the attention of the Division of Community Life, National Museum of American History, by Matt T. Salo and donated to the Smithsonian by Dr. de Wendler-Funarol's widow, Cornelia de Funaro, in May 1985, through Richard E. Ahlborn, Curator.
The number and breadth of the photographic materials, especially, the accompanying documentation and their representation of many Gypsy groups in a single time period, make this collection an important resource for research.
Print and Manuscript Materials
The print and manuscript materials in the collection are organized-into six series: (1) materials for which Carl de Wendler-Funaro is author, co-author or editor; (2) materials about de Wendler-Funaro; (3) correspondence; (4) journals, books, or extracts from them, by various authors; (5) newspaper and magazine articles; (6) photomechanical images from newspapers, magazines, and books.
The manuscript materials include drafts of portions of planned books, reading notes, and Gypsy language notes and transcriptions. De Wendler-Funaro seems to have planned two books. One was to have been a book of his photographs, with accompanying essays describing his encounters with Gypsies, the other a work on Gypsies, especially those in the United States. The major element of the second book was to have been the history of the Rom in this country as told by Steve Kaslov. The second work was to have included the manuscripts, 'The Last Caravan,' on Romnichels in the United States; 'Romanian Gypsies in Maspeth Village,' on the Ludar; 'Hungarian Gypsies,' orx these musicians in the United States; and some folk tale materials. Several outlines for the two books are in the collection.
The draft materials written with Steve Kaslov include an account of the Gypsy leader Chaiko Jura. The account, which seems to approach legend at some points, describes his immigration to the United States, adventures in this country, and death. Also among the draft materials, and intended to follow in the proposed book, is what may be termed an official biography of Steve Kaslov (c. 1888-1949). Apparently tentatively entitled "The Ways of my People,' the manuscript recounts a few incidents, told at length, in the experiences of Kaslov's family and social network from about 1900 to about 1938.
De Wendler-Funaro's notes suggest that the Kaslov biography was dictated to an unnamed lawyer in the early 1930s and given to de Wendler-Funaro in 1934. Kaslov dictated the story of Chaiko to de Wendler-Funaro. (Perhaps this is the source of a statement in the New York Sun, June 20, 1941, that Kaslov had written two books.)
The okaslov manuscripts' are written mostly in a variety of American English common among American Rom. Parts of the biographical section are written in the first person, others in the third. Cultural material includes descriptions of weddings, funerary ritual, business transactions, conflicts and conflict resolution. As factual sources the manuscripts are unreliable: dates, for example, are only very approximate; birth places for Steve Kaslov and his family are incorrect.
Evidence in the manuscripts indicates that de Wendler-Funaro hoped, through 1976, to publish these texts in some form. Apparently Kaslov made a first attempt to publish in 1940, when he sent a draft to Eleanor Roosevelt. Mrs. Roosevelt sent the manuscript on to George Bye, a literary agent, who returned it in 1941 as unpublishable, calling it a Oterribly disorganized manuscript .... [Kaslov] is now working with a doctor (de Wendler-Funarol who claims to be an author but the results are very unhappy' (Correspondence in FDR Library).
Correspondence in the collection (series 3) includes letters to and from de Wendler-Funaro; drafts of letters by Steve Kaslov, soliciting aid for Gypsy education; and correspondence between the U.S. Consulate in Matamoros, Mexico, and the U.S. Department of State. According to Mrs. de Funaro, Carl de Wendler-Funaro destroyed his other correspondence before his death.
Many of the books, journals, articles, and extracts in the collection (series 4)- are materials upon which de Wendler-Funarol's dissertation is based. They include typed transcriptions of published articles as well as printed matter; dates of the materials range from 1554 to 1979.
The collection includes about 2,000 photoprints, including multiple copies, and 2,000 negatives. These materials are organized into eleven series: (7) photographs by de Wendler-Funaro: Gypsies in the United States; (8)photographs by de Wendler-Funaro: Gypsies outside the United States; (9) heirloom photographs'; (10) photographs by other creators; (11) photographs ;rom commercial agencies; (12) photographs of non-Gypsies; (13) photocopies, of numbered photos, in numerical order; (14) negatives; (15) contact sheets made from negatives from by the Smithsonian Office of Printing and Photographic Services, 1986; (16) scrapbook sheets; (17) slides made from negatives and prints by the Smithsonian Office of Printing and Photographic. services, 1986.
The original photographs by Carlos de Wendlet-Funaro span the,period 1922 to 1966, but the majority were taken from about 1932 to about 1942. More than half the photographs are of the Rom group of Gypsies in the United States, and most of these were taken in New York City from about 1938 to about 1942. Other original photos by de Wendler-Funaro are of other Gypsy groups in the United States -- Ludar, Romnichels, 'Black Dutch,w and Hungarian musicians -- as well as of Gypsies in Mexico, Holland, Germany, Austria, France, England, and Hungary. Photographs by other creators include copies of portraits collected from Gypsy families, photos by other photographers, and commercial news photographs collected by de Wendler-Funaro.
De Wendler-Funaro seems to have used the photographs to gain access to Gypsy families and communities (many photos show Gypsies examining albums and sets of pictures). Some photographs were published in his 1937 article, and in two articles by Victor Weybright (1938a, 1938b). De Wendler-Funaro apparently also used lantern slides made from these photographs in lectures on the subject of Gypsies; a handbill advertising his availability on the lecture circuit is part of the collection.
Manuscript drafts for book outlines, introductions, and accompanying essays show that de Wendler-Funaro long nurtured hopes of publishing a popular tool-, 'Incorporating his photographs. To this end he numbered and captioned more than a hundred of these; a partial list of captions is part of the manuscript files. For the most part, the captions are not very helpful in understanding Gypsy cultures. Photocopies of these pictures with captions, in numerical order, are in box 8. With some exceptions, most of the photographs can be used to study costume, personal ornament, and kinesics; these will not be listed separately as subjects in the inventory. The photos of the Rom in New York City show several types of traditional costume, contemporary modish dress, and a wide range of variations on both. Taken together with the "heirloom photos' collected from the same group, they show change and variety in men's and women's dress.
In the photographs of individuals and groups one may compare, for example, sitting positions of women with relation to costume and use (or non-use) of chairs.
Most of the photographs of Rom taken in New York City show Gypsies relaxing on stoops or in the street during the summer, a common pastime in their neighborhoods. They contain little culturally specific information other than that discussed above.
Information on housing is most clearly represented in photographs of camps, in which the type of tent and, to some extent, the relationships of tents, are visible. All the tents shown appear to be commercially made. Since it was the practice to raise the tent walls in good weather, many photos also show tent interiors, with wooden platform floors used on non-grassy sites (Rom) or linoleum as a ground cloth (Romnichel). The use of featherbeds; either alone (Rom) or with bedsteads (Romnichel) is documented.
There are few photographs showing the use of interior space in urban storefront or apartment dwellings (Rom). The photographs taken in the Maspeth, Long Island, 'Gypsy village' show exteriors of the shacks built@by the Ludar.
Of cooking and heating equipment, the cast-iron or sheet-metal stoves of the Romnichels are most evident. The Rom are shown using a variety of equipment, the traditional trivet (Mexico), the Coleman-type camp stove (U.S), and the pot-bellied coal stove (New York City).
Photographs of autos and trucks, auto-drawn luggage trailers (Romnichels in the North), and horse-drawn wagons (by the horse and mule trading Romnichels in the South) reveal something of the transport of people and goods.
A few photographs show subjects at work, but most work pictures are static demonstrations or mere associations with productive enterprise. There are demonstrations of coppersmithing and fender repair work (Rom), and manufacture of rustic furniture (Romnichels), as well as posed demonstrations of palm-reading. Romnichels in the South are shown posing with horses and mules. The business that appears most frequently is fortune-telling, through photographs of roadside business tents (Romnichel); amusement, fair, and resort-area tents and stands (Rom); and canvas facades, banners and signs carrying the fortune-teller's message.
Ritual life is poorly represented in the photographs. There are some photos of a funeral procession, and one interior shot of a funeral; two photos of a saint's-day feast; one of a memorial feast; and one set taken in preparation for Christmas festivities. Curiously, there are no photographs of Rom weddings. The dearth of pictures of rituals and celebrations, which form so important a part of Rom life, may be due to difficulties with interior lighting.
Because of internal and other inconsistencies, exact dating of the photographs is often difficult. Discrepancies of as much as ten year occur in some of the dates in de Wendler-Funaro's notes.
Arrangement:
Collection is arranged into seventeen series.
Biographical / Historical:
According to information supplied by Mrs. de Funaro, Carl de Wendler-Funaro was born in Brooklyn, New York, on October 12, 1898. After attending Boys' High School and Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn, he attended the University of Illinois and Cornell University, receiving a bachelor's degree in entolomology from Cornell in 1923. Subsequently he taught foreign languages at New York University, the McBurney School of the YMCA in New York City, Newark Academy and Wagner College. He began graduate work in the late 1930s, and in 1958 earned a doctorate from Columbia University with a dissertation on 'The Gitano in Spanish Literature' (a copy is in the collection, Box 1, folders 2 and 3). De Wendler-Funaro retired from teaching in 1963; he died in Tucson, Arizona on February 15, 1985.
Carl de Wendler-Funaro was an avid amateur collector of insects, especially Coleoptera, as well as shells, minerals, stamps and coins; his insect collections were donated to the American Museum of Natural History in New York.
De Wendler-Funaro's interest in Gypsies, according to his manuscripts, began in childhood. The manuscripts and one published article indicate that this interest continued to be personal, rather than professional,,,,apd @hat,,he, did not pursue his contacts with Gypsies systematically. (it was, not, 'until' the late 1940s that anthropologists began systematic studies of GYPSY.@ cultures.) It appears that de Wendler-Funaro sought out Gypsies in fairgrounds, amusement parks and urban storefronts, collecting specimens of language and taking photographs. Irving Brown's letter to de Wendler-Funaro (1929), and de Wendler-Funarol's article in Leisure (1937) refer to his visits to amusement parks. Some of his Romnichel (English Gypsy) subjects recall him as the man who drove along the roads, stopping to take pictures wherever he saw a tent. About 1938 de Wendler-Funaro became involved with a Committee on Gypsy Problems of the Welfare Council, a social service agency of New York City. This involvement may have been an outgrowth of his association with Steve Kaslov, styled by some a Gypsy king. De Wendler-Funaro seems to have served as Kaslov's amanuensis.
Gypsies in the United States:
Several groups, all known to outsiders as "Gypsies," live today in the United Sates. In their native languages, each of the groups refers to itself by a specific name, but all translate their self-designations as 'Gypsy' when speaking English. Each had its own cultural, linguistic, and historical tradition before coming to this country, and each maintains social distance from the others. An overview of these groups and their interethnic relations is presented in "Gypsy Ethnicity: Implications of Native Categories and Interaction for Ethnic Classification," by Matt T. Salo.
Rom
The Rom arrived in the United States from Serbia, Russia and Austria-Hungary beginning in the 1880s, part of the larger wave of immigration from southern and eastern Europe in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Primary immigration ' ended, for the most part, in 1914, with the beginning of the First World War and subsequent tightening of immigration restrictions (Salo and Salo 1986). Many people in this group specialized in coppersmith work, mainly the repair and retinning of industrial equipment used in bakeries, laundries, confectionaries, and other businesses. The Rom, too, developed the fortune-telling business in urban areas.
Two subgroups of the Rom, the Kalderash ('coppersmiths') and, Machwaya natives of machva,' a county in Serbia) appear in the photographs iiv, this collection. De Wendler-Funaro identified some, but not all, Kalderash as, 'Russian Gypsies.' Another group he identified as "Russian Gypsies' seem, to,, be the Rusniakuria ('Ruthenians'), who in New York are known as musicians and singers.
Ludar
The Ludar, or "Romanian Gypsies,' also immigrated to the United States during the great immigration from southern and eastern Europe between 1880 and 1914. Most of the Ludar came from northwestern Bosnia. Upon their arrival in the United States they specialized as animal trainers and show people, and indeed passenger manifests show bears and monkeys as a major part of their baggage. Most of de Wendler-Funarols photographs of this group were taken in Maspeth, a section of the borough of Queens in New York City, where the Ludar created a village of home-made shacks that existed from about 1925 to 1939, when it was razed. A similar settlement stood in the Chicago suburbs during the same period. One of de Wendler-Funarols manuscripts, "Romanian Gypsies at Maspeth Village,' (box 1, folder 9), and a letter from Ammiee Ellis, a social worker (box 2, folder 2), refer to this settlement.
Romnichels
The Romnichels, or English Gypsies, began to come to the United States from England in 1850. Their arrival coincided with an increase in the demand for draft horses in agriculture and then in urbanization, and many Romnichels worked as horse-traders. After the rapid decline in the horse trade following the First World War, most Romnichels relied on previously secondary enterprises, 'basket-making,* including the manufacture and sale of rustic furniture, and fortune-telling. Horse and mule trading continued to some extent in southern states where poverty and terrain slowed the adoption of tractor power (Salo and Salo 1982).
Photoprints in box 6, folders 2 through 10, correspond with de Wendler-Funarols trip described in his manuscript 'In Search of the Last Caravan' (box 1, folder 10). Discrepancies between this manuscript and the photos should be noted. De Wendler-Funarols notes date this trip variously between 1931 and 1945. I have dated it about 1940. Although one man appears as a frequent subject in the largest set of photos (box 6, folders 22 and 23), in the manuscript, de Funaro mentions having missed meeting him.
'Black Dutch'
Gypsies from Germany, whom de Wendler-Funaro refers to 'as Chikkeners (Pennsylvania German, from the German Zigeuner), sometimes refer to themselves as wblack Dutch.w They are few in number and claim to have largely assimilated to Romnichel culture. They are represented in de Wendler-Punarols photographs by a few portraits of one old man and briefly referred to in the manuscript mIn Search of the Last Caravan.*
Hungarian Gypsies
The Hungarian musicians also came to this country with the eastern European immigration. In the U.S. they continued as musicians to the Hungarian and Slovak immigrant settlements.
Provenance:
Collection donated by Mrs. Cornelia de Funaro, June 26, 1985.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Photographs by de Wendler-Funaro are available for reproduction. Fees for commercial use. Permission to reproduce photographs by Alexander Alland must be granted by the photographer's estate; other photographs may have copyright restrictions.
Topic:
Funeral rites and ceremonies -- manuscripts -- Gypsies Search this
