Today's photo of fireworks double exposed over a sherbet sky comes from the photographer Otto Dreschmeyer. Dreschmeyer was a resident of Ridgewood (briefly Brooklyn, once and currently Queens) and the son of German immigrants, about whom very little is known. Dreschmeyer was an amateur photographer who captured the kinds of images many of us have on our photo rolls today: parades, cats, and fireworks. Have you ever tried to take a photo of fireworks? Not all of Dreschmeyer's attempts were successful. Relateable! Below you can see two other attempts from a different year. Read through the finding aid for this collection to learn more about Dreschmeyer and the photos he took, or browse the digitized slides online.
Brooklyn Public Library, Center for Brooklyn History
Brooklyn Public Library, Center for Brooklyn History
Dreschmeyer's slides were donated to the Brooklyn Historical Society in 1987 by the Greater Ridgewood Historical Society at the Vander Ende-Onderdonk House. The Vander Ende-Onderdonk House "is New York City’s oldest Dutch fieldstone house", host to Arbitration Rock, and a personal favorite of mine.
Interested in seeing more photos from CBH’s collections? Visit our online image gallery, which includes a selection of our images, or the digital collections portal at Brooklyn Public Library. We look forward to inviting you to CBH in the future to research in our entire collection of images, archives, maps, and special collections. In the meantime, please visit our resources page to search our collections. Questions? Our reference staff is available to help with your research! You can reach us at cbhreference@bklynlibrary.org.
This blog post reflects the opinions of the author and does not necessarily represent the views of Brooklyn Public Library.
Post a Comment
While BPL encourages an open forum, posts and comments are moderated by library staff. BPL reserves the right, within its sole discretion, not to post and to remove submissions or comments that are unlawful or violate this policy. While comments will not be edited by BPL personnel, a comment may be deleted if it violates our comment policy.
eNews Signup
Get the latest updates from BPL and be the first to know about new programs, author talks, exciting events and opportunities to support your local library.