Snapshots of the Past

[Four boys, three of them on beam of ruins(?) of building, playing with toy swords, Harlem, New York] – Antique Photo Print

[Four boys, three of them on beam of ruins(?) of building, playing with toy swords, Harlem, New York], [between 1932 and 1940] — historic print
[Four boys, three of them on beam of ruins(?) of building, playing with toy swords, Harlem, New York], [between 1932 and 1940]. Historic print from the New York City collection.

(Originally scanned by the Library of Congress. Each image is professionally and digitally cleaned of artifacts such as color bars and extra borders prior to printing.)

Description

This rare historic print captures [Four boys, three of them on beam of ruins(?) of building, playing with toy swords, Harlem, New York] in remarkable detail. It comes from the collections of the Library of Congress, scanned from the original and carefully restored.

Framed, it is ready for the wall; unframed, it is ready for the frame you choose. Perfect for a home, office, library or classroom wall, and a gift with a story behind it. Free shipping in the lower 48 states. Snapshots of the Past has been bringing history to the wall since 2001, for tens of thousands of customers worldwide.

[Four boys, three of them on beam of ruins(?) of building, playing with toy swords, Harlem, New York]

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Three of the four boys in this Harlem scene are up on a beam at what the record describes as the ruins of a building, playing with toy swords. Between 1932 and 1940, Harlem was a dense neighborhood of tenements, and vacant or partly demolished lots often became informal playgrounds for children with little other space to play. The print is a halftone, a process that let newspapers and books reproduce photographs in large numbers, and the catalog lists it under book illustrations. The question mark after "ruins" suggests the cataloguers were unsure of the structure, so the scene is best read as a glimpse of everyday street play.

Created / published[between 1932 and 1940]
Medium1 photomechanical print : halftone.
GenreBook illustrations 1980-1990.Halftone photomechanical prints 1980-1990.
SubjectsChildren playing outdoors--New York (State)--New York--1930-1940. African Americans--Children--New York (State)--New York--1930-1940.
SourceLibrary of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division
Original scan3,253 × 4,096 px · prints to 11 × 14 in at 300 dpi
ReferenceAMZ-SOTP-HPA-179250

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