Glass photographic negative reveals special story
A “wonderful bit of Anna High School history” and its football team has come to life with the discovery of a 112-year-old glass photographic negative that was recently found at Isom’s Antiques along North Main Street in downtown Anna.
Melvin “Tunney” Isom was a life-long antique dealer who owned and operated Isom’s Antiques for more than 25 years.
“First American Picker”
Isom’s daughter, Lisa Eads, fondly recalled: “My dad was the first American picker. He and my sister Patty would travel the road between Jonesboro and Cairo, stopping at houses along the way and asking if the occupants had any antiques or other things they wanted to sell.”
“My dad acquired the items he sold in his store by this process and never from an auction,” Patty Isom Frank added. “He also acquired items from people who would bring things into the store for him to buy.”
Tunney Isom died on Sept. 28, 2016, at the age of 90.
His son, Mike, kept the business open prior to, then following, his father’s death. Over the past two years, he and his sisters have undertaken the task of liquidating the treasures which are in three store buildings occupied by the business.
In August 2018, Lisa Eads pulled several glass negatives from a drawer behind the counter and showed them to local genealogist and family historian Dr. Susan A. Whitemountain.
Whitemountain did not buy the glass negatives at that time. The names labeled on the envelopes that held the negatives were not familiar and Whitemountain did not know how, or if, the negatives could be processed.
As time went on Isom’s business was open less and less.
Taking Another Look
When Whitemountain received news that Mike would have the store open one afternoon in February, she said that something tugged at her to go to the shop and have another look at those old glass negatives.
This time, Whitemountain bought the collection of 16 glass negatives and brought them back to The Gathering Place, a genealogy business she operates on South Main Street in Anna.
Whitemountain said that at first, it appeared that the varied images on the glass negatives were not connected.
One was labeled “Banning Home Atwater Ill.,” another “Cummings House Blytheville, Ark” and still another “Talo Cave Mt Grove Mo.”
Many were with people: a group standing in front of a house labeled “Horace Etter & Friends,” a farm scene with a yard filled with sheep was labeled “Barns Sheep,” a store with two men that was labeled “Etter Store” and, a group of people standing in a yard that was labeled “Barns & England Group.”
A couple of the negatives were of classroom students labeled “Lake Fork” and “Hettick” schools and one was of a group sitting on a farm wagon that was labeled “Baptist Sunday School.” The images all appeared to be circa 1910, Whitemountain said.
After doing considerable research, Whitemountain said she was able to connect the images on the glass negatives to the Etter family in Macoupin County, Illinois, and eventually to a surprised descendant in Aurora, Colo.
In solving the mystery of the old glass negatives Whitemountain also learned to process photo images from glass negatives.
This newly acquired skill proved to be extra special for what happened next, she said.
Isom’s Antiques closed for good in mid-May, and as the final boxes were being packed, Lisa Eads discovered two more glass negatives and an old wedding picture that had been taken by “Atkins” in Anna, Illinois.
The items were brought to Whitemountain at The Gathering Place.
Although one of the glass negatives was damaged, the second negative was in pretty good shape and appeared to hold the image of a sports team.
Whitemountain said she initially thought that the glass negative was somehow connected to the other 16 plates she had already processed and researched.
A Local Connection
But when one of the players in the old football photo appeared to be the same young man as the one shown in the Atkins wedding photo it became apparent the picture had a local connection.
Questions remained: Who was the young man in the wedding photo, and what football team posed for the photo so very long ago?
Whitemountain began to research the images and said she soon found “a wonderful story woven into their history with a remarkable ending.”
A junior high school was built on Green Street in Anna in 1868. When the public high school was organized in 1888, classes were held on the third floor of the junior high school building.
A news article found online documents that Anna High School had a football team as early as 1897. Anna High School defeated Cairo High School 16-0 in a football game that was played in 1897 in Anna.
It is likely that football was being played even earlier in Anna, but the sport gained increased popularity in high schools in the early 1900s.
In 1918 Anna High School became a part of Anna-Jonesboro Community High School. Between 1892 and 1918 there were 261 graduates from the old Anna High School.
Whitemountain said that in doing the research to find the identity of the football players in the old photo, a copy of the same photo, titled “Anna High School Championship Football Team of 1907-08” was found on page 550 of Volume II of George E. Parks’ History of Union County.
Also listed was the names of the individuals who posed for the pictures so long ago.
“When you view the historical Anna High School photo today, you can feel the youth, energy, excitement and life in the faces of each of the young men in the picture,” Whitemountain said.
Farms and Barns Photography Exhibit
Part of the Shawnee Hills Arts Council’s “Farms & Barns Photography Exhibit” which is underway at the Anna Arts Center is Whitemountain’s history of Anna High School, as well as the prints from the “Glass Negatives,” circa 1905-1910.
The exhibit can be visited Tuesday through Friday, from 11 a.m. until 1 p.m., until a closing reception.
The reception is planned from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. on June 28.
Admission is free to visit the exhibit and to attend the reception. Refreshments will be served at the reception.