Monday 29 September 2008

Old Photo of Dunedin about 1862 Princes Street


Just got this in mail today. A great photo of Princes street in Dunedin. I had a look on Timeframes A great site to see some of the National Libraries holdings. It takes a bit of navigating around and don't go on it after midnight as they seem to shut all their servers down.

Anyway, there is a copy of this photo there.





I at first thought it the same but noticed a few differences; mine is not cropped so much and the library one seems to have a name written in the negative to the lower left corner as well as a few more scratches. (The National Library images are not high resolution - to encourage you to buy a print!)

This photo also appears on page 11 of Hardwicke Knight's book "Photography in New Zealand" pub 1971 - he attributes this photo to William Melluish who seems to have had his studio very near here. The National Library says photographer unknown. Knight uses it as an example of how these photos from collodian glass plates are a bit "faster" than earlier so you can see people who are not moving too much but there are still "ghosts" of moving carts and people.

In the photo can be seen the following names:
Day & Mieville
W & J Barr - Butcher
James Bird & Co. Auctioneers, Commission & Shipping Agents
A. Mercer ships chandlers
a milner?

On the rear of mine it says Princes Street Dunedin & Dunedin looking down main street.

It came on the same page as another print.




This is labelled on rear - Club Hotel, Dunedin and "Club House - This club is now broken up"

I have no idea where or what this was so if any one knows ...


There is a small shield over the door but too indistinct to see much


2 comments:

courtneycotton01@gmail.com said...

Tim, I noticed on TimeFrames today that they are closed from Midnight to 3am every night for backing up their files. Not good for us night people is it! 2am to 5am would have been much better.
Cheers....Dawn

Tim Edwards said...

Yes, I quite agree - maybe a few emails to the National Library suggesting this would get some action