NEW! Hertzberg Finding Aid/UPhO #8

The Southeastern Architectural Archive (SEAA) recently finalized the processing of the Rudolf Hertzberg Louisiana Architecture Photographs. Levee engineer Rudolf Hertzberg (1906-1982) donated the prints and corresponding negatives to the Tulane School of Architecture during the Second World War. These were part of an open collection that served faculty and students. During the 1970s, those contact prints and negatives still extant were transferred to Tulane University Libraries. Hertzberg donated an additional set of prints and negatives in 1972 and Library staff unified the two donations to form a single collection that entered the SEAA when it was founded in 1980.

Read more here.

Anyone know the location?  Van Geffen's Bakery was located at 1325 St. Bernard Avenue, but we have been unable to locate the Susie-Q-Inn. This is one of many Unidentified Photographic Objects [UPhOs] in the SEAA.

UPDATE:  KUDOS to the SEAA's Kevin Williams for locating the structures, 1201-1203 St. Philip Street/1005-1007 Henriette Delille Street (formerly St. Claude).

Image above:  Rudolf Hertzberg, photographer. Susie-Q-Inn. 1201 St. Philip Street/1005-1007 St. Claude [Now Henriette Delille Street]. New Orleans. Circa 1938. Rudolf Hertzberg Louisiana Architecture Photographs, Southeastern Architectural Archive, Special Collections Division, Tulane University Libraries.

UPhO #7 NOW Identified

Another gem from the Southeastern Architectural Archive's collection of unidentified photographs. Any ideas?

Bingo! This is St. Michael's Chapel-Tomb (1895), St. Roch Cemetery No. 2. Prior to its restoration,

Image above: Unidentified photographer, location unknown. Miscellaneous Photographs Collection, Southeastern Architectural Archive, Special Collections Division, Tulane University Libraries.

UPhO #6

Over the summer, Tulane University's Julia Broussard has identified a good portion of the Southeastern Architectural Archive's unidentified photographs (UPhOs).

We are hoping someone out there in the blogosphere can identify the name/location of this Louisiana raised plantation.

UPhOs #4-5

Unidentified photographer, Louisiana Views: Southwest Coast, undated. Miscellaneous Photographs Collection, Southeastern Architectural Archive, Special Collections Division, Tulane University Libraries.

I mentioned in earlier posts that the Southeastern Architectural Archive is home to an extensive collection of partially identified or fully unidentified photographs that document the Louisiana built environment. These two photographs are from a series of views of the state's southwest coast, all black-and-white, all square-format images mounted to embossed cardstock.

A year ago, the New York Times published Robin Pogrebin's article on the post-Katrina architecture of New Orleans, referring to it as "posthurricane vernacular" and naming individual styles: The Defensive; The Defiant; The Do-Good.

More recently and more expansively, Chicago-based Alexander Trevi has posted a series of essays and/or pictures addressing coastal building on his landscape architecture-focused Pruned blog. To read more, click here.

Any help in obtaining more information about our photographs would be much appreciated!

UPhO #3: Unidentified structure, undated

The Southeastern Architectural Archive has no information on this historic photograph. Does anyone know anything about the structure or the photographer?

This is part of an ongoing series of UPhOs (Unidentified Photograph Objects). Speculations appreciated!

[Photograph: Unidentified mounted albumen print. undated. Miscellaneous Photographs Collection, Southeastern Architectural Archive, Special Collections Division, Tulane University Libraries].

UPhO #2: New Orleans Tavern Scene, 1934

This 1934 photographic print from a nitrate negative reveals a good deal of cultural information: spittoons in the foreground, bottle labels of the stocked bar, the National Recovery Act sign on the left wall, the Anheuser Busch advertising prints, the posted photographs of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Can anyone identify the tavern? The photographer? The barkeep?

This is the second in a new series of Unidentified Photograph Objects. . . from the collection of the Southeastern Architectural Archive. The first UPhO was recently identified by anthonyturducken who will be the recipient of an SEAA prize!

[Unidentified photographer, unidentified bartender in unidentified New Orleans tavern, contract print from nitrate negative, 1934]

New Orleans Location Unknown: UPhO #1

Walker Evans took this photograph in January 1936 for the Farm Security Administration (FSA). He identified it on a caption card as "Degenerate period of early twentieth-century New Orleans architecture. Louisiana."

PBS will air a new documentary about the FSA starting in August. "Documenting the Face of America: Roy Stryker and the F.S.A./O.W.I Photographers" is narrated by the chairman of the N.A.A.C.P. Julian Bond. It will air on station WLPB on August 18 at 9:00 pm.

Does anyone know where this structure was/is? This is the first in a new series of Unidentified Photograph Objects. . . from the collection of the Southeastern Architectural Archive. The reproduction of the uncropped print from the nitrate negative (click on thumbnail in the above right) may help for context.

UPDATE: Thanks to flickr anthonyturducken for ID-ing this house as the structure at 1439 Annunciation!

[Photograph Left: Detail of Walker Evans, Degenerate Period of Early Twentieth-Century New Orleans Architecture. 01.1936. Copy print from the FSA-OWI Collection/Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress LC-USF342-001291-A. Southeastern Architectural Archive, Special Collections Division, Tulane University Libraries; Right: Walker Evans, Degenerate Period of Early Twentieth-Century New Orleans Architecture. 01.1936. Uncropped print from nitrate negative, FSA-OWI Collection/Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress LC-USF342-001291-A. ]

Lexicon: alberca, algibe, citerne, cuve, cistern, réservoir

Newspapers across the country were reporting a drought in late nineteenth-century New Orleans. The 5 June 1898 New York Times commented:

It is hard for us rain-soaked Northerners to believe, but there has been a long
drought all through the region of which New Orleans is the centre, and the
people of that city are face to face with a water famine. It is true that despite
the failure of the clouds to do their duty, the Mississippi has not yet run dry, and
as the water works of New Orleans gets their supply from the river, one
unacquainted with the circumstances might suppose that no scarcity could
exist. The trouble is that the city doesn't own its water works, and the company
which does charges such enormous prices for its service that a large majority of
the people still trust to ancient cisterns. The contents of these have been
getting steadily lower for some time; now many of them are empty and the
others might as well be, for the small amount of semi-liquid matter in them is
a peril to the health of everybody that drinks it.

Cisterns were known in local parlance by a number of different names: alberca, algibe, citerne, cuve, réservoir. The above-ground variety, shown here, were normally used in the late 18th-19th centuries, were iron-strapped cedar barrels. A pipe connected to the house supplied running water. The house depicted in this picture is roofed with shakes, also called known by variant names merrain, merin, miren (called pickets in English). [For more information on the nomenclature, see: Jay Dearborn Edwards and Nicolas Kariouk Pecquet du Bellay de Verton's A Creole Lexicon. Baton Rouge: LSU Press, 2004]. anthonyturducken has posted a current-day Uptown New Orleans cistern on flickr.

Today's New Orleans is witnessing the daily loss of millions of gallons of potable water. To listen to John Burnett's National Public Radio report, click here.

The image above is one of many unidentified photographs in the collection of the Southeastern Architectural Archive. Handwritten on the back is the notation: "N.O. housing -- slums." Any assistance in identifying the location of the photograph would be much appreciated!