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Richard Wall House Museum photograph collection
Notifications
Held at: Richard Wall House Museum [Contact Us]1 Wall Park Dr., Cheltenham Township Historical Commission, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, 19027
This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the Richard Wall House Museum. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.
Overview and metadata sections
"Richard Wall's house stands at the entrance to Wall Park [in Cheltenham Township, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania]. The original section of the house is dated 1682 and additions were completed in 1727 and 1800. It is the most historic building in the Township and, until 1978, was the oldest house in continuous residence in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The Wall name was lost when Sarah Wall, Richard's granddaughter, married George Shoemaker. The Shoemaker name is another name mentioned quite frequently in association with early development in the Township. Their daughter-in-law developed the Shoemaker Mill on the Tookany Creek, and Shoemakertown (now part of Elkins Park) developed around it."
Bibliography:
Cheltenham Township. "History." Accessed August 28, 2012. http://tinyurl.com/oxa88ex
This collection is comprised of photographs accumulated over time by the Richard Wall House Museum. An array of photographic processes are represented, including a daguerreotype, a tintype, glass plate negatives, lantern slides, color slides, cabinet cards, cartes de visite, as well as more modern processes on paper. The photographs are mostly from Cheltenham Township, Elkins Park, Glenside, Wyncote, and nearby areas in Eastern Montgomery County. They depict local individuals, families, and groups; buildings, including mansions (perhaps Lynnewood Hall) and schools (such as Beaver College); cars and carriages; streets, parks, and public places.
Of special interest are: a survey of buildings along Old York Road (many located on the 8000 block) done by Edwin J. Davis, S.R.A., circa 1950, with photographs, property values, and remarks about building conditions; about 60 color lantern slides of a local mansion and gardens in Wyncote, circa 1920s (perhaps Lynnewood Hall); and about 2 dozen 1940s class photos.
The collection also includes a large number of photographs of the Richard Wall House, objects owned by the Museum, and Museum exhibitions.
Photographs collected at various times from various sources by the Richard Wall House Museum.
Summary descriptive information on this collection was compiled in 2011-2012 as part of a pilot project conducted by the Historical Society of Pennsylvania to make better known and more accessible the largely hidden collections of small, primarily volunteer run repositories in the Philadelphia area. The Hidden Collections Initiative for Pennsylvania Small Archival Repositories (HCI-PSAR) was funded by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
This is a preliminary finding aid. No physical processing, rehousing, reorganizing, or folder listing was accomplished during the HCI-PSAR project.
In some cases, more detailed inventories or finding aids may be available on-site at the repository where this collection is held; please contact Richard Wall House Museum directly for more information.
Subject
Place
- Publisher
- Richard Wall House Museum
- Finding Aid Author
- Finding aid prepared by Celia Caust-Ellenbogen and Michael Gubicza through the Historical Society of Pennsylvania's Hidden Collections Initiative for Pennsylvania Small Archival Repositories
- Sponsor
- This preliminary finding aid was created as part of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania's Hidden Collections Initiative for Pennsylvania Small Archival Repositories. The HCI-PSAR project was made possible by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
- Access Restrictions
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Contact Richard Wall House Museum for information about accessing this collection.