Ella’s Kith and Kin

Here’s another family portrait featuring John Capewell’s wife Ella and one of his sons seated on the far left. My guess is that these are members of Ella’s family. The woman in the upper row, second from the right is Ella’s mother.

Some of these other people can be seen in some of the other photos I’ve posted. They may be cousins. I’m not sure. I had posted a photo earlier featuring what I assumed was Ella’s immediate family. Mom, possibly Dad, a brother and Ella. This gang may be the extended family, and they look to be a fun bunch. I like the smiles which are unusual for what were lengthy exposures.

Once again Capewell has some of his subjects seated in the lodgepole furniture that we’ve seen before in these posts.

Ella (Mrs Capewell) and (probably) John, Jr are seated on the far left.

There’s a magazine or a newspaper on the ground featuring a large advertisement for Egg-O-See Cereal. It was a boxed cereal that was introduced in 1906 and promised “so many of the elements necessary to health and proper nourishment.” In my research I found that they advertised heavily. I guess some things with breakfast cereals have always been the same.

About The Capewell Glass Negative Collection

The Capewell Glass Negative Collection is a series of about 200 5-inch by 7-inch glass negatives shot early in the 20th Century by John Batt Capewell (1878-1951) of Westville, New Jersey. John passed the negatives down to his son Henry who left them in his wife’s possession upon his passing. Henry’s widow didn’t know what to do with them and didn’t particularly want them so she offered them to my Dad who couldn’t turn down anything. Ultimately I wound up with them and thought I would one day have photographic prints struck from them. That didn’t happen, but I came up with the digital workaround of placing the negatives on a lightbox and rephotographing them with a digital camera. The “processing” was then done on a computer with image editing software. They came out better than I thought they would so I thought I would show them off to the world on this site. Many of these pictures have not been seen in a century, and I’m proud to be presenting them today.

At first, I did not know who the people were in the photographs. I have a box of ephemera that accompanied the negatives and snagged a few clues from that as far as the Capewell name. I did some research on the internet and had a few false starts and wrong turns, but the readers of these posts have provided a remarkable amount of research and detail. I’m amazed at what people have turned up sifting through public records and such!

Last Week: Flowers by the Fence