Dating Old Photographs Halvor Moorshead introduces Family
Chronicle's guide to the way our ancestors looked. There are
probably few family historians who do not possess a number of
unidentified and undated photographs. For most of us, pictures
taken within the last 30 years are not hard to date. We will
probably know the subject but, even if we don’t, there will be
plenty of clues: hair length on young men, hem length on young
women, general hair styles and so on. The earliest known
photograph taken in North America was taken in October or
November 1839. It is a common mistake to assume that trends in
fashion are something fairly new. This is only because we are
far less familiar with fashions of previous periods; at a quick
glance they all seem much the same. Anyone who has spent time
examining old newspapers can’t have failed to notice the
advertisements promoting the “latest fashions.” Just as
hairstyles for both men and women now change every few years, so
they did in our great-grandparents’ time. An addi