Americana-- Photos from the '50s by Charles Custer

**Joe O'Hara** · 4-Jul-2021, 05:46

Link here. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/gallerie...s-America.html

The article (from the UK Daily Mail Online, July 3) does not say whether his pictures will be exhibited or published in the future, but it would be a shame if they were not. To me they have a look reminiscent of Walker Evans, but not so coldly clinical and distant as Evans could be. They are from an era that was fading but still visible when I was a kid in single digits. Others here may also remember the drugstore/soda fountains from their old neighborhoods, the hexagonal tile floors, the exuberant clutter of the old time mom and pop shops.

Apparently he used an 8x10 view camera. The lighting, composition, and technical quality are excellent. Like the best documentary photographs, they are full of detail and redolent of nostalgia.

**Tin Can** · 4-Jul-2021, 06:02

I can walk to that

well maybe not as I have not visited them in 18 months...

Plague

**Jody_S** · 4-Jul-2021, 10:40

Why does it look like someone did HDR to all of those?

**Molli** · 4-Jul-2021, 16:54

I'm not going to comment on the restoration quality as I'm hugely biased, but the rest of the images can be found here:
https://www.okmorephotos.com/backtothepast

They've numbered the photos in the hope of gathering information about them. So, if you recognise anyone or have anecdotes about the particular locations, please do contact them. This is some of my favourite type of sleuthing, but I was born and raised on the wrong hemisphere, in entirely the wrong era, so no help whatsoever.
Wonderful photos!

**sharktooth** · 4-Jul-2021, 18:51

It definitely was a white world in the 50s.

**Two23** · 4-Jul-2021, 20:36

Originally Posted by sharktooth

It definitely was a white world in the 50s.

Depends on where you go. It's a big country. I've traveled quite a bit along the back highways of SK and MB and it didn't seem any different.

Kent in SD