This image has not only has it seen some better days, but is pretty old and of poor quality to begin with. The guess is it was taken in 1915 in front of their home in Anderson, IN based on the rough age of a cousin who appears in similar photos. What really stumped me, was why it had that blue color. Most photos that discolor with age go yellow, not blue. I searched all over the internet but didn't get any answers. At first I thought it might have been a tintype photo and maybe they degraded with a blue tinge instead of yellow. I don't have a lot of experience with those type of photos, but nothing I could find referenced it. I finally spoke with my Dad who told me because they were pretty poor back in the day, this was likely printed by my Dad's cousin in his own darkroom on drafting blue print paper, which gives it that unique blue color. I felt like Scooby-doo solving a mystery! Unfortunately, it also looks like maybe it had paper or a book on top of the main portion of the image, leaving the rest exposed to the sun to fade.
A little Photoshop magic, and here's what the image maybe should have looked like. I couldn't completely get rid of the texture from the original paper it was printed on, but it does clean up nice. Did you notice there's a collie on the ground behind Albert? I didn't see him until I started cleaning up the image.
Seriously.. Thoughts?
I had to blow it up to see the Collie!
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