Lightness and laughter radiate in glass negatives from 1910s being digitized for online archive

San Francisco Chronicle / April 25, 2026

1,500 recently rediscovered glass negatives from 1910 to 1920 are slowly being digitized at www.SFMemory.org. All are the work of Samuel Marmaduke Crow, a professional photographer whose more personal collection had been lost for generations.

SNIP

What’s most striking are the facial expressions and body language Crow captured. Most surviving photos from that time are posed, with subjects either looking very stern, very stiff or both. Crow clearly had a gift with people. The candid photos are sometimes silly — the heads of two models for Liberty war bonds break through a poster — often joyful and almost always unguarded.

Chronicle link: https://eedition.sfchronicle.com/infinity/article_popover_share.aspx?guid=7ed7339c-4a4f-45d1-a065-712006149742&

Website link: https://sfmemory.org/index.php

Gallery link: Gallery: https://sfmemory.org/search/index.php?q=%22sam+crow+negatives%22&_ds=1&bn=0&bs=1000&so0=contains&so1=contains&sk=5&desc=0

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Awesome collection. Three out of hundreds: