Wisconsin Historical Images from the Wisconsin Historical Society
May 2013

FEATURED GALLERY
| Highlights from over three million photographs in our holdings



A view of flooding in a residential area of Cassville, Wisconsin, circa 1910 WHI 93272

The Cassville Photographs of Frank W. Feiker
 

Around 1905 photographer Frank W. Feiker moved from Milwaukee to Cassville, Wisconsin, and for the next half-century he documented the daily life of that typical Mississippi River town. In this gallery we've brought together 147 of his best photographs. They range from intimate portraits to sprawling landscapes, and their subjects include everything from subterranean mineshafts to aerial views from bluff tops. Many images bear his signature "Souvenir" mark, denoting that the image was used on a postcard. The Feiker collection provides a rich visual record of Cassville over several decades and exhibits the work of a typical early 20th-century, small-town photographer.

 

Cassville's Downtown and River Life

The collection contains many photographs of businesses along Cassville's main streets. This makes it possible to trace the history of the community's built environment during the first half of the 20th century by using Feiker's images.

Like most visitors to Cassville, Feiker was fascinated by the Mississippi River. Many of his photographs show vessels of different types over a 50-year period, including an iceboat, barges, ferries and steamboats.

 

One glass-plate negative contains 16 images of Cassville and is marked, 'Souvenir,' as if it were intended for a set of postcard views to be sold together. Feiker also photographed floods, shipwrecks, mining, farming and rural life.

 

  


BROWSE THE COLLECTIONS | View nearly 60,000 digitized visual materials in our online database


  Things Once Seen
 Richard Quinney Photographs 

 
Richard Quinney has spent more than 40 years documenting his life, time and community through photography. Intimately tied to and intrigued by place, this gallery features images from his newest book.

View the Gallery >>

  William S. Jones
 Native American Photographs     


A resident of Wisconsin most of his life, William A. Jones served as U.S. Commissioner of Indian Affairs from 1897 to 1905, when he acquired almost 400 photographs documenting Native Americans and their lives.

This monthly email newsletter from Wisconsin Historical Images features gallery exhibits from the Wisconsin Historical Society's visual materials collections.
Wisconsin Historical Society
816 State Street
Madison, WI 53706

Link to Society's website at wisconsinhistory.org

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