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- Office Xmas Party: 1925
- ... 2.0 Four years after behaving scandalously at the Krazy Kat, our bohemian friends find themselves slogging away at desk jobs in ... Posted by Dave - 12/15/2023 - 3:04pm -
![ It's two Fridays before Christmas, time for a hallowed holiday tradition here at Shorpy: The Office Xmas Party! Which has been going on for 98 years now. Will Clarence in Sales ever get up the nerve to ask out Hermione from Accounting? Is there gin in that oilcan? Ask the bear.
December 1925. "Washington, D.C. -- Western Electric Co. group." There are enough little dramas playing out here to keep the forensic partyologists busy until Groundhog Day. National Photo Company Collection glass negative. View full size.
Leer Kings"That Guy" looks like he could be the son of the older leering man directly to the right of him. I shall call them Denis Leery Jr. and Denis Leery Sr. The two men with them are obviously Christopher Walken as The Continental, and a young Franz Mesmer.
Just a little creepy....Some of the looks on their faces, wouldn't you love to know what they were thinking!
Debauchery 2.0Four years after behaving scandalously at the Krazy Kat, our bohemian friends find themselves slogging away at desk jobs in the boring adult world. Just WAIT until the Christmas party, though!
The oil canOf course the bear and the cabin weren't mentioned -- everyone knows the best part of the party is getting well-oiled!
Thank you. I'll be here all week. And don't forget to tip your server.
H.P. Lovecraft?Could it be? Standing in front of the "Go Go" guy, half hidden? Maybe Franz Kafka, instead? This would be the guy who takes an extra-long time in the lav in order to scratch unseemly things onto the stall partitions. Every office has one of these guys and in this office, its either him or else its the nearly invisible guy standing across from him on the other side of the tree. Also, the girl on the far left, standing in front of the door, is unforgivably cute. I'll bet she's told a lot of these guys "NO" and that's why she's way over there.
The Power Bloc ...Have you happened to notice how Big Boss Man - the guy holding that little stubby cigar - is surrounded by thugly-type guys? This is the power bloc for this office. The guys up on the top left are all from a different Department and are wary of Big Boss Man's thugs. There is a little bit of cross-pollenation, however. The first guy standing on the table at the right is shooting a bemused glance in the direction of his bud in that other Department. He's the shorter, unjacketed guy with the full frontal grin and the eyebrows in serious need of plucking. To them, this is all a goof. They hang out together and keep each other informed as to who says what about whom, which of the girls are doable and what the scuttlebutt is coming down from the top. There's more here but I don't want to get censored.
A Story in every faceThis photo can inspire everyone to write a novel because there is indeed a colorful character with his own personal bio in every set of eyes. The bald guy with the candle on his head particularly stands out as one who has a complex persona but so does everybody else in the picture. Some appear depressed, some look beat up, some seem desperate. Make up your own scenarios. Personally, I used to look forward to the office parties when the most unexpected facets of co-workers' personalities would be revealed, giving us the rest of the year to talk about that until the next one. Stuffy old lady accountants and spinsters turned out to shock us the most when relaxed by a "touch of the grape". Lots of fun, too bad they have mostly been eliminated. Thank you for this blast from the past.
[That's a "GO-GO" traffic signal on Mr. Complex Persona's noggin. - Dave]
WiredCould it be that they tapped the power for the Christmas tree lights from the ceiling fixture?
What a mod hairdo!The brunette peeking from behind the desk (right above the black purse) has such a 1960's hairstyle!
Fat ChanceThe corpulent boss, stogie in hand, actually thinks that removing his glasses improves his appearance. He also seems to be playing footsie with the marcel-waved cutie who inexplicably has an oil can in front of her.
A KnockoutThe woman with the pearl necklace sitting at the very corner of the desk is a knockout! She looks like a present-day actress whose name escapes me. The guy standing up and glaring into the lens at the extreme top right of the photo may very well be the Antichrist. His stare gives me chills. The guy behind him looks like an "evil character" straight out of Central Casting. This is a great photo.
Thought BubblesIt would take me all day to write out thought bubbles for what I imagine is going through all those heads, but the lady at dead center seems to be thinking, "What was IN that punch? Did they repeal Prohibition and nobody told me?"
The "dark lady" downstage right is thinking, "I hope they snap that picture before I freeze to death down here on the bare floorboards. You would think the electric company would have better heaters in its own offices, but old man Pennyfarthing won't even spring for a rug to keep the draft out."
Western Electric (Shock Therapy)Great pic. And I'm sure there are as many stories as people in this one. But let's admit that the lady sitting on the floor on the left has to have the most interesting one. There is a haunted, post-experimental-therapy look to her that immediately reminded me of the psych-ward scenes in "Changeling."
Where's the copier?Ahhh, the days before every office had a copier, and every office had some joker trying to get the temp to sit on it!
Re: Fat ChanceWait -- so the oil can is worth noting, but not the bear statuette or the small house?
Western ElectricWestern Electric was the manufacturing and distribution arm of American Telephone and Telegraph. I suppose that this office in Washington was one of their distribution points. At any rate one interesting thing about the photo is the decided separation of men and women as though they might have come from different sections of the business. I also note that the ladies are sitting on a pretty rough floor, which is something I would have thought they would have avoided in those clothes. As to the glasses, I suspect that the photographer cautioned them that the flash might reflect from the lenses, assuming that I can assert that there was flash. Who knows, maybe there's a window somewhere.
That Office GirlI find her the most intriguing face in the picture. She looks almost out of place in this setting... her face is striking. Her expression says that she's part of a back story going on around the office that no one knows about.
Wow. I'm falling in love with a woman who's long long dead. How sad is that?
GiftedJudging by the peculiar items in the shot I'm thinking they exchanged white elephant gifts at the party. I got a big stuffed fish at our last party. I would have preferred the oil can.
This is so great!A bevy of attractive females here but I'm partial to the blond girl standing at the far left of the photo.
Wowzer!
Also, standing next to Boss Stogie on his left: ladies and gentlemen ... Mr. Joaquin Phoenix.
The Black WidowQuick somebody, get the story on the raven-haired woman sitting in front of the desk.
She looks like she ate her young; perhaps she has a few "missing" husbands buried in her dirt-floor basement.
I get the very distinct impression that if you crossed her, you ended up joining the silent majority long before your time.
Dark LadyWell.....the woman at bottom left certainly catches the eye. Something of a femme fatale, I think. Not generally popular with the more strait-laced ladies, like the woman two to her right who's giving her a very frosty look. The younger woman though, above and slightly to the left, is more sympathetic.
Since it's not uncommon here on Shorpy for unflattering comments to be directed at the olden-days womenfolk, let me be the first to say what a grim bunch the men are. I'll make an exception for the guy under the tree.
Getting Oiled at the Office Xmas PartyThe oil can on the foreground floor is absolutely precious. There can be no rational explanation for it. Then again, one tends to get oiled at the office party.
The hot babe is standing, far left, if not the girl sitting left, in pearls by the purse on the desk corner.
The fat guy with the cigar has his conjoined twin growing out of his forehead.
Girls on one side, boys on the other? Weird.
How dare these people all die off before telling us why that guy is holding the little horsey?
"Hey, Griselda. Spin my copter. If it says 'STOP - STOP', you are not mine. If it says 'Go - GO', oh you kid!"
Most riveting photo ever.I've been a lurker on Shorpy for months, but this photo has prompted me to register and comment. I've been coming back to this picture every day since it was posted, showing it to everyone I know.
What strikes me is that though there are several vintage-type characters here, there are also quite a few very contemporary looking people as well. This photograph represents such a vibrant living moment in the lives of these people. Some of them look like they could speak to you right from the picture. And, oh what a story they could tell!
This photo takes first place from my previous Shorpy favourite, They Shall Remain Nameless.
(But it's so close... check it out if you missed it.)
Ansel Adams had the Zone System... I'm working on the points system. First I points it here, and then I points it there ...
Shining, gleaming, streaming, flaxen, waxen......hair! I think that's my favorite part of this picture. There's such a great group of hairstyles among the women. A few of those girls were pretty darn good with the curling iron, or whatever they used. I wonder if they're more glammed up than usual for the big party. For some reason, the hairstyles are more striking to me than in other pictures. Anyway, fascinating as always.
P.S. I think the guy that bdgbill thinks looks like the antichrist is actually kind of a hottie. I'm going to go on the assumption that he didn't look that intense all the time. If he did...well, I could see bdgbill's point then.
Now I KnowMy father worked for Western Electric. The money wasn't very good, so I never figured out why he stayed there. Guess this answers the question.
IN and OUTI noticed the IN basket on the desk to the far right, but where's the OUT basket? I sometimes wonder why I have an OUT basket on my desk at work - it's always less full than the IN one.
The woman sitting on the floor to the far left bears a striking resemblance to the Italian actress Ana Magnani (The Rose Tattoo).
Dramatis PersonaeMona, the woman on floor, far left (one of the few without the Marcel wave), is probably a Suffragist or at least politically active. Maybe she's trying to organize these party animals into a union and all they want to do is balance traffic signals on their heads and be wildly social.
Don't mess with these guys!The boss from Hades has what looks like a goose egg on his forehead and the coatless guy on his right has a black eye and cuts on the nose and eyebrow: maybe the partying started the night before. Looks like a smoking hot curling iron was de rigueur for any well-coifed lady.
That guyOf the four guys standing in the upper right, the guy who is on the left side, closest to the tree -- which girl is he leering at?
Western ElectricIf you flip the picture around, you can sort of read the door sign. I can make out:
504
[Western Elec]tric Com[pany].
[INCORP]ORATED
[?]ION DEPARTMENT
I wonder what the missing part is. Administration?
Office TensionThis must have been just after Phyllis spilled the beans about Dwight and Angela. Poor Andy!
The Power Bloc, continuedThe balding gent just over Boss Stogie's left shoulder-- the real power in the office, he certainly looks confident that his recent appointment to regional director will lead to greater things. Boss Stogie's son, Junior (with the candy cane), was on the fast track to becoming a junior partner until he was befriended by Harold from the mailroom (his hand on Junior's shoulder), which displeased Boss to no end.
UndercoverIsn't anyone going to ask why the woman in the middle is wearing a hat with a Police badge? Is this a costume xmas party? Could she possibly be a real cop??
My GirlSay what you want about the woman on the floor or the blonde with the pearl necklace, but my heart belongs to the woman standing fourth from the left, middle row. She reminds me of Bernadette Peters.
The henchman second from the right at the top has a menacing Snidely Whiplash quality about him. You just know he slipped a mickey into someone's drink.
Re: Western ElectricYou know you're a Shorpy addict when you "get" Anonymous Tipster's reference to the photographer's use of flash (or WAS there a window somewhere?!). Nice shot, A.T.!
Twins or Sisters?Study the features of the young woman directly in front of the door - then look at the one just to the right of (and looking directly at) "blondie with the pearls". Eyes, hair, smile, shape of face, body build: if they are not twins then they must at least be sisters. It is uncanny!
Christmas BackstoryYes, the young lady at the lower left leaning against the desk has the most interesting backstory in the room. Thanks to the passage of time we'll never know what was behind her haunted expression beyond that the woman giving her the evil eye must have had something to do with it.
Dave continues to put these evocative photos up knowing our emotions will never be satisfied!!
Meanwhile, notice the vintage Chia Pet resting on the scales in the "shipping department" (the desk along the left side). The girl in the fake police hat is looking longingly at it. Chia bunny? Chia elf?
The guy in front of the Christmas tree holding the toy, "I got a PONY!"
Keep them in their place.I, too, wonder why all the women are sitting on the floor in their silk satin dresses with fur collars. Surely there were some men who would have been glad to give up their places for them (and to sit amongst the women!)
How did they get Xmas light strings in 1925?I thought people used small candles until the '60s. How did they happen to have these string lights? Great pic of us back then.
[The 1960s being, I guess, when covered wagons brought in the first supplies of wired Christmas lights. - Dave]
I spy...Second woman in the third row...Frida Kahlo, at her day job.
SpellbindingI cannot stop looking at this picture. So much to see. The Al Capone looking guy is mesmerizing. The guy at top, second from right gives me the creeps.
1920'sI'm kind of young so maybe I'm missing something, but did pretty women not have to hold jobs in the 1920's? This office is worse than the one I work in, I didn't think that was possible.
Re: 1920sI'm kind of young too, but I disagree with you. I think this office has quite a collection of lovely women (and some not-as-lovely ones too, just like today). Sometimes, it's hard to look past the hairstyles and the clothes. If you are young (20-something? younger?), you've really only seen one ideal of beauty--you've missed a lot of the different fashions and hairdos of the rest of the 20th century. You also underestimate what modern makeup does for women. There are so many more varieties of it today than there were then, and it's generally of higher quality and easier to use than in the past. If you took one of the women in this picture, say, the girl with pearls sitting next to the desk and plunked her down in 2008 to get a makeover, her hair would be longer, probably highlighted and dyed, and aided by daily washing and a host of conditioners. Then, add some good moisturizer, foundation, and concealer, as well as a lash curler, mascara, and a healthy helping of eye liner, and I'm guessing you'd think her quite the fox.
Conversely, take the most attractive woman you know now, and put her in short hair and marcel waves, take away her hair dye and most of her makeup, and I'm guessing she'd look quite similar to the ladies in this photo. Even something as simple as the shape of plucked eyebrows really change the look of someone, and with the change in aesthetics, it's sometimes hard to get past the fashion to see beauty.
It works with the men too--you'd probably look a lot different with a side part and a pompadour!
That's right . . .. . . pretty women did not have to work in the '20's so, Miss Oilcan's exemption is assured, in my opinion - what a hottie.
Foy
Las Vegas
That's my desk!I have a desk that's identical to the one on the left. I had guessed it was 1940's vintage. It's nice to see it's even older than I thought.
Record Breaker?Look at the stats on this photo: 53,000 + reads, and still climbing. That's a lot of forensic partyologists! I wonder if even Dave knew what he had pulled out of the hat with this one?
[I am shocked. Shocked! - Dave]
re: Xmas light strings LOL! Dave, a lot of your comments (like this one) crack me up! Are you a comedian in real life? Merry Christmas!
[Please folks, no applause. Just throw money. - Dave]
Hotness quantificationI count 20 women in that picture; most of them you can see no more than their face and hair, and two you can't even see all of that.
Out of the 18 you have a good facial shot of, I'd put 3 of them at 8.5-9.5 on the scale... three of them are SMOKING hot. I'd put another 4 at the 7-8.5 mark, meaning serious cuties, and at least three of the others are a 6 -7.
Where I work we have 100 women in my office; I'd put exactly three in the 8.5-9.5 scale, and another 10 in th 7-8.5 scale; of the rest, probably only a smattering are really in the 5+ range.
So, I have to know ... where do you work that the women are so attractive? Playboy Enterprises?
Taking into account the differences in style, these women were, mostly, very attractive, and even a couple of the less attractive weren't awful.
The Men of Western ElectricIn the interest of gender equality, I got to wondering about the relative charms of the office boys. I found three who tickled my fancy.
1. The tall smiling fellow whose head is sticking up behind and to the right of Police Woman. His face is open and honest, he's smiling with his twinkly dark eyes as well as his mouth, and although his ears are a bit prominent there's a lovely overall symmetry to his face. I'll call him Dimples.
2. The one man who has the sense to sit down with the ladies. He's a bit older, but I love his soft wavy hair. There's a certain aristocratic but slightly sad angle to his tired half-smile that puts me in mind of a young Prince Philip. I'll call him Phil.
3. OK, here's the hotness - the brash, cocky young sheik peeking out confidently between the heads of Boss Stogie Pennyfarthing and his wan shirtsleeved assistant. He's got the eyes of Frank Sinatra and the hair of Jack Kennedy. I don't know what he looks like from the neck down, but from the Arrow collar up he's all, "How YOU doin'?" I'll call him Frankie.
In summary: Were I one of the office flappers, I would ride in Frankie's Studebaker, nurse a secret unrequited crush on Phil, and take Dimples home to meet Mother.
Rogues' GalleryI can't stop staring at the chilly filly down by the leftern desk. She looks like three out of every five women I've ever fallen for. It's the eyes. As to the resemblance to Ana Magnani, she might be of Italian descent.
I am also like the older gentleman in the upper right. Mr. Leery Senior, was it? Right between Charlie Sheen (or Leery Jr.), Snidely Whiplash, and Mr. Deer-in-the-headlights. What a jovial sort. And a snappy dresser, as well. Conversely, the startled fellow's vest is well off-center and makes him look like he couldn't decide which part of him was the front. Or maybe he was taking a nap under a desk just before the photo op and somebody had to drag him out.
Funny how a photograph will turn Bob & Lisa from the office into Dick Tracy characters once you let your imagination do the walking. Thanks to all you for sharing your insights.
You were linkedA local blogger from Beaumont's newspaper linked your site today. I will be forever gratful! Nevermind I got absolutely nothing done today and instead pored over your site at length. This is truly an awesome site!
This Won't DoOne chubby gal. One chubby guy.
As an official with the State of California, I say that this does not pass muster. There was hiring discrimination here. Walk into any State office and you'll see what I mean. Not to mention the plethora of Caucasians.
The chubby gal is next to sheet music. Wonder what this melba toast group was singing?
They're all dead nowJust think ... they all had their youth, their lives, their personalities, and now they are all turned into worm food. Just a happy thought for Christmas.
No, wait a minute. . . okay, I've changed my mind. Now I like Miss Lookingaway, sitting in the lower left. Definitely. She's the one.
Foy
Las Vegas
Oil Can GalThe siren sitting with the oil can is undressing me with her eyes. I'll ignore the fact she is 112 years of age, and let her.
[Guess that explains the oil can. - Dave]
Houdini?The guy on the left side, just above and to the right of the P.D. hat girl....did Houdini make a special appearance? In any event, he's got a mean set of eyebrows.
And you are correct, Stinky, the girl on the far left by the door is surely a looker!
Lost in the crowdNobody seems to have spotted Hugh Grant peeking out between Stogie Boss and Bald Guy.
Famous facesTo keep Hugh Grant company, fellow British comic actor Rowan Atkinson is peeking out from behind Shirtsleeves.
He is not a crookOh, my gosh. There's Richard Nixon on the upper right (with face partially hidden) just below old boss and crooked-vest guys.
Roxie & Co.I love this picture, and all the comments! Here's my .02:
*Girl with the oil can doesn't want to undress you, she's too in love with herself. You can see it in her eyes; she's a Roxie Hart if I ever saw one. "Eat your heart out, Sophie Tucker."
*I swear I graduated with the girl who has her hand on Roxie's shoulder. She's the one who organizes all our class reunions.
*If I were one of those girls, I'd probably want to date the guy sitting on the desk, right hand side. However, I have a feeling he'd want to "just be friends." So,
*I'd have to go for the one behind Ol' Pennyfarthing. No, not that one, the bald one. Handsome features and sense enough to not put some ridiculous piece of fur on his head.
*Girl leering at our castoff looks like one of Cinderella's stepsisters. Drucilla, I believe.
Office HottieI think the guy looking over the RIGHT shoulder of chubby-stogie dude is hot. There's something about the eyes that grab me. And the hint of a smile.
British InvasionNot only Hugh and Rowan - isn't that the actress/singer Patsy Kensit on the left, standing in front of the office door?
Can't Get Over This PhotoI can't get over this picture. It's my favorite one on Shorpy, which is saying a LOT. And, it has nothing to do with my collection of high-end Western Electric phones from 1905-1939.
The woman in front, referred to as the "Black Widow," I can't look at her enough. She surely would get a large kick out of the ruckus she would caused in 2008, unless it bored her as also being commonplace in her own time. The woman over her left shoulder has movie star looks.
They are on the fifth floor, and I wish I could see the name on the glass door. Then again, the woman obscuring it may be the one to take home to meet the family, so she can stay.
The finish on the floor is badly worn, as contrasted by the part under the desk. These fellas were habitually hustling to and fro, and with the feminine charms represented here, it's no wonder. Office romances must have been all there rage therein.
I have been hoping the Farkers would be all over this one, except they love to specialize in the one-person quirk shots. I could place the Black Widow in countless situations...
Is this the only picture you have on this stunning group?
[Afraid so. - Dave]
If onlyTterrance had taken this photo! We would know all about it, mystery solved.
I thinkthe mysterious suicidal communist was probably a cleaning lady whom the photographer sort of forced to be in the picture and she's embarrassed to be photographed in shabby clothes and feels naturally out place amongst the staff with whom she's always been subservient.
She reminds me of Camille Claudel on her way to the madhouse.
50 Little IndiansThis photo looks like a cast of characters who would end up in an Agatha Christie mystery....and I'm pretty sure I know who did it!
The Officethis picture reminds me of the TV show The Office. Jim is sitting on the desk in the right corner. Pam is all the way to the left in the back row. Michael is the guy with his hand on Jim's shoulder although he should be the bossman with the cigar. Stanley is the guy between the man holding the horse and the man with the cigar. Creed is Mr Leery. Kevin is holding the horse. Dwight is the only guy in glasses. Kelly is the bobbed woman behind the desk with the permanent smile on her face. Meredith is the creepy woman off alone... she's just waiting for her next drink of alcohol. Andy Bernard is the guy to the right in the back with the striped tie. I couldn't decide who Angela was. Ryan is the deer in headlights next to Andy. Phyllis is in the satiny dress to the right. Oscar is right by the right hand edge.
Man I love this picture.
AngelaAngela's sitting on the floor with that big lace collar, giving the stink-eye to Meredith.
Naughty NaughtySome young lady has just done something naughty off screen left. The Leery Boys approve, the Black Widow and Stink Eye don't, and the young lady behind Stink Eye is too drunk to comprehend.
Also, is the bald man by the Christmas tree wearing a traffic signal on his head, set to "Go?"
Somewhere in this crowd must be Col. Mustard, Miss Scarlet and Prof. Plum.
My favorite pictureI and my co-worker check this site at least three times a day. He has never been on the Internet and when he passes by he will invariably ask "Anything new?" Which I know to mean "Anything new on Shorpy?" This Christmas Office Party is our favorite. We both live in Maryland and have seen many of the areas displayed in these pictures. When we scan the Office picture and see the "mob boss" guy with the stogie and the gun in his pants, he does a great Al Capone voice. I hope my posting this comment will bring new fans to
this amazing photo.
Merry Christmas everyone!have a great holiday and prosperous New Year.
Oh Christmas Twig! Oh Christmas Twig!Considering it is 1925 and an urban area they probably had a hard time locating a showpiece Christmas tree. Probably the best they could do was this poor little immortalized twig.
Timeless peopleEver notice how nearly every photo of a large group, from about 1900 on, contains at least one person who looks like he/she could have been photographed in just about any decade, or just the other day? The lady by the desk behind the pretty girl with the pearls looks like a teacher at my kids' school! There is nothing about her teeth, hairstyle, makeup, etc., that gives away the fact that she was photographed in 1925 except, of course, for most of the other people in it.
The Timeless DeskI'm still using the exact same desk as the one in the photo; my wife purchased it from McGill university when they replaced the professors' desks in the mid 1960s.
Oh what funAdolf (second from right at very top) has quite the leer going on. Peter Sellers could imitate him well. Mystery Lady could have been even more beautiful. I imagine her long hair flowing and her prominent features brought out even more with an expert's touch.
What is Stogie Man carrying, besides his eyeglasses? I also wonder who took this photo. It obviously took some arranging, with the piling up of people.
Excellent, almost spellbinding picture! I come here about six times a day just to visit it. I wonder who lived the longest, and what year they all died and how? Yes, I'm a morbid one.
Office A-Go-GoThe gent at the back is, indeed wearing the miniature street signal (it has 4 arms to the signal so not a railway signal) on his head. Firstly, the only thing behind him is a fire extinguisher hanging on the wall, certainly nothing that the signal could be perched on. And, secondly, if it was sitting on something, it would not be sitting at the angle it is.
Then and Now I'm wondering -- in today's world there is usually at least one person at an office party of that size who gets a little too inebriated and winds up making photocopies of their nether parts for distribution to all. Was there a way to do the same thing using a mimeograph machine or whatever other copying technology existed in 1925? Would the tipsy individual first have to draw their naughty bits on some special copy medium? Our grandparents sure had a lot of hardships to deal with.
At First Glanceand in the zoomed out view, I thought the gent at the far right might be the office troublemaker and that the folks wrapped him up in Christmas lights for his just deserts. Alas and alack, when you go in for a closer look, it's simply the ravages of time taking their toll on the negative.
[This batch of plates has water damage along one side. - Dave]
The Lady of the Deskjust wandered in from the Sergei Eisenstein film that was shooting on the set next door. She's on a break between takes of the Odessa Steps sequence.
RE: Oh GreatIf CBS could give us Rudolph, Shorpy can give us Western Electric.
2010 InterpretationsThis year, I think the Black Widow has pretty much just had it with that place.
Stink-Eye isn't looking at the Black Widow. She's disapproving of something messy on the front of the desk.
I can't find Don Draper Nor Joan Holloway, but this sure conjures up thoughts of Mad Men, 45 years earlier. I burst out laughing when my eyes scanned to the guy in the back with the stop and go-go item on his head! Maybe THAT is the flavor of the evening? More GO than STOP? This is the roaring 20s after all and these are certainly modern women..
Yes, this picture and your readers' comments may be my very favorites to date!
Some Like It Hot The mademoiselle standing in front of the woman wearing the Policeman's hat could have been Billy Wilder's inspiration for his casting Jack Lemmon in drag.
Another WorldThese people are denizens of another universe that, no matter how many photographs we study or books we read, we will never fully understand because we didn't live in it and never will.
These are people who knew how to navigate themselves in the distant world of 1925. All of these people were born at the beginning of the last century and were brought up by people from the 19th century.
If a modern young person were to be suddenly transported here without preparation he would find it completely disorienting and possibly quite frightening, because of so many technological and cultural and social differences between now and then.
Deja vuI loved this picture.
But the lass in front of the desk, looking stage right, is memorable. I think I've seen this picture before.
Then I noticed the dates of the previous comments. 2208? Surely two years cannot have gone by so quickly.
[To say nothing of the 198 after that! - Dave]
SteamyThere are some SERIOUS sexual crosscurrents and hot vibes in this picture! Amazing!
Slow on the uptakeI'm pretty sure Mr. Semaphore head isn't actually wearing that thing on his head; it's behind him. What is alarming is the second head growing out of his chest. The heads seem to be in agreement to lurk.
Oh great!Shorpy is doing reruns for the holidays.
Kidding.
Merry Christmas.
Uh-Oh TannenbaumThat's the most bedraggled Christmas tree I've ever seen. It has more tinsel than needles.
An unflattering portraitMy god, this is by far the ugliest group photo I've ever seen! Both girls and guys look like winners from the Walmart Ugly Photo Contest.
Kimono-wearing parrot?With a bouffant, no less? Over there, on the scale!!
The gal with the candy cane, to our left of the much-ballyhooed oil can chick, seems to be presaging late '60s hairstyles.
And yes, the balding dude in the rear with the traffic semaphore on his head wins the covert group-photo clown award in spades.
Sad to SaySo many hotties, so many dorks.
Season's GreetingsHope everyone has a wonderful Holiday Season, from Walter and all his friends in this, my favorite Shorpy picture.
General Electric Crime FamilyOk, a lot of the men look like mafiosi with the big-lips guy in front being the capo. The two guys at the right, top, are hit men.
Western Electrical FireI can't believe, in 90+ comments on this remarkable photo, that not one person pointed out the extension cord running from the ceiling light fixture to the tree. I think the answer to the comment about how and when these folks died is: a few minutes after this photo was taken, in a horrible electrical fire.
It would be a chore, but could someone pleasecolorize this!
BeautyI love the woman sitting on the floor next to the desk looking away. At first glance you think; boy she looks tired, and then you look again and you see how beautiful she really is. She is just stunning. I also find it interesting with the commentary just how similar our comments in the office were to the ones posted on this site. We too made up stories about these folks. I love this photo. Thanks for sharing it.
I never tire of looking at this one.Always noticing something new, frinstance,
The object on the scale, seems to have some heft to it based on how far the scale dial has moved, maybe a cast iron toy?
The young fellow on the far right, Candy Cane in his right hand but whats on his left hand? Looks like it's slipped inside of something, a toy holster maybe?
Completion All this tableau requires (perhaps) to make it complete, is a large paper bag on the floor stuffed with goodies, including the obligatory pair of turkey-feet protruding upward in a festive fashion.
Best of the Season to All in the Shorpyverse Continuum!
Secrets never revealedThere is no question that many secret alliances and not-always discreet hook-ups probably took place during and after this festive celebration 86 years ago. Luckily for those involved, there were no surveillance cameras, cell phone cameras, tape recorders, security guards, texting devices or other pesky snooping devices that could cause the merrymakers a permanent record (and deep lifetime regret) of their missteps. They were the roaring 20's when people gathered their rosebuds where they may and parties were for having the best time you could have. I'm betting many of these revelers took their sweet and sordid memories of that night to their graves.
Another Shorpy Party!I love this photo and we're going to test the limits of the reply counter. Merry Christmas everyone and have a grand new year!
Lord Almighty!!!It's the butler in the pantry!!!
I have never, ever seen so many guilty people in one photograph.
Unbelievable that it was not staged. But it obviously wasn't.
Wow!!!
My hat!How did she get it?
"Pure horse, Danno. Book 'em."Having just spotted the drug paraphernalia on the left - the scale, the packaging materials, the kimono-wearing parrot - our undercover coppette in mid-pack has whipped out her official police hat and ignoring the cries of "that baggy's not mine!" is about ready to haul the whole gang downtown. A bust like this baby was sure to bump her upstairs and away from all these dreary office parties.
Up to no good?The gal sitting on the floor behind the Oil can has had a drink or two already, and she is plotting mischief. I can see it in her eyes! Was she the good time that was had by all?
Cost of that treeCould not have been more then a dollar in 2011 money
Must have been last minute!!!
The ion DepartmentA quick flip of the door confirms we are in room 504 of the ion Department.
FestivusIts good to see this one again. I just keep looking at the people and see more than a few that would have been great company. I hope everyone, viewers, commenters, Dave and webmaster Ken has a great Holiday Season in the company of friends and loved ones.
She apparently had a good time with my grandpa.As she is my grandma!
"The gal sitting on the floor behind the Oil can has had a drink or two already, and she is plotting mischief. I can see it in her eyes! Was she the good time that was had by all?"
3rd rowfrom the top 3rd from the left. I'm in love.
Oh wait.
Party HeartyOoooo -- Roaring twenties office party, bathtub gin. Oooooo -- I think I just threw up in my throat a little bit.
Shorpy Christmas cardIf Dave would produce an annual Shorpy Christmas card I would buy a few boxes, and I'm sure others would as well. Cards with this photo would be seen in every business cubicle in the country and quite a few places around the globe. It says Merry Xmas for me.
So much to read into This picture is as familiar to longtime readers of this blog as our own family photos and as evergreen as that Christmas Tree was before it was cut down. One can imagine so much here, for example that as soon as the photographer finishes with his duties, the Volstead Act will be violated by most of the people in this room (there are a few who look as if they might disapprove), and the usual office party shenanigans will occur, some of which might have consequences in the months to follow even if they all swear that what happens at the Office Party stays at the Office Party.
Al JolsonIs that Al Jolson in front of the "Traffic signal" bald guy? He's peering out just a bit from behind the guy with the vest and holding his glasses. 1925, the timeline is right. :)
Iconic StatusThis photo has taken on a level of immortality that few others can hope to achieve. A Photograph for the ages that will always be appreciated and admired. A Tradition is born! Thanks to Dave and all that visit here; hopefully someday your office pictures will be shown here and we can all marvel at how far we've come in so short a time.
Tiny Tim said it best so I shan't repeat it but that is my wish for one and all.
Thank you, DaveI hope this re-posting will bring new fans. Merry Xmas,everyone!
Why the oil canThose three objects in front - Maybe just spur-of-the-moment party silliness?
Another year olderI just love this photo. There's so much to analyze. Saw it last year for the first time. Here we all are, another year older. That would include those in the picture, in a macabre sort of way.
Best Christmas Party EverFirst, Dave, you have cured my holiday depression. I found this during a post-Xmas hangover and there are no words. I was instantly addicted to your site. Thank you.
Second, if there is anyone out there with connections to the BAU I would like you to seriously consider imposing yourself on that relationship and get them on it. I'm dying for a more complete story. You must be too if you're reading this. You know who you are. Pick up that phone and give him/her a call.
Not Al JolsonWade in NW Florida: if he looks like anybody of that period, it would most likely be Eddie Cantor, not Al Jolson.
The other 13I have just spent an extremely enjoyable hour reading all the comments reaching back to 2008. Of the 47 people in the photo, 34 have been commented on. So what about the other 13? Six guys in the upper left have been ignored, plus seven gals in the pack. The most prominent of the abandoned baker's dozen are, to my mind, the two women standing side by side, closest to the tree. Both have bead necklaces: one tucked in, one on the outside. They seem neither hot nor cold, neither suicidal nor drunk. The two of them actually look (dare I say?) like really nice people.
NOW it's the holiday season.....when Shorpy breaks out this holiday classic! I wonder what pop-culture figures of the past year will be likened to our hard-partying crew?
The face that could sink a thousand shipsThe guy holding the cigar, oh man I want to punch his face!
Every yearEvery year when I look at this, I think the same thing: do all those dames hate Desk Woman for the same reason, or different ones?
Lots of single women in that officeNo wedding rings on almost all of them. Perhaps a woman worked until she got married, or at least until she had children - and then she was sequestered in the kit home built in one of America's booming trolley suburbs.
It must have been a major change for these ladies to go from office life, with its daily human contact and pleasures (such as this office party) to a few rooms, kitchen and nursery figuring predominantly. My grandmother still reminisced proudly about her work as a lawyer's assistant in the 1920s, way back before she got married, had three children, and spent most of her time in the top floor of a Boston triple-decker for the next 20 years.
Colorized Version Hidden in Plain SightCheck out https://www.shorpy.com/node/11937 for colorized version in Colorized Photos by members. Dave, do I get a prize for finding it?
Talk About Your Lonely HeartsThis could be the Sgt. Pepper album just before The Beatles stepped into the shot
Par-TAY!I totally wanna party with this crew. I've always loved the Roaring-Twenties era, and the show Boardwalk Empire is doing a great job with the fashions and the music. I think Nucky Thompson needs to sprinkle a little Xmas cheer on this group. Volstead Act be damned!
Young bald guyEvery time I see this, my eyes go to the young, very handsome man who is looking over the shoulder of the rather portly guy on the right side of the photo. Balding men didn't have many options, then, like they do now, but I rather doubt that the premature balding kept all the young ladies away from him!
I wonder which of these men were veterans of WWI?
At the Ion Department Christmas Party . . .That exotic woman sitting in front of the desk in the lower left STILL seems distracted by something just out of camera, and the woman in front of her is still watching her carefully.
It's a wonderful photo worth our annual holiday attention!
--Jim
Naughty or Nice?This oft-repeated photo is starting to remind me of the traditional holiday tune by Eric Cartman (of South Park fame) singing about the Swiss Colony Beef Log; irreverent but fun.
What's printed on that document?Dave, can you zoom in on the piece of paper being held by the guy kneeling in the center, right in front of the tree? It's almost as if he's trying to show it to the camera. Thanks!
-------------------------------------
Just a something something
TO WISH
You and Yours
A Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year
Division Four Office
1925
Worth a second or third look There are some half dozen ladies in this photo. Like the one right behind the corner of the desk, with the chevron shapes on her dress and the one directly in front of the door on the left that are definitely worth seeing again.
Merry Christmas Shorpyites!
Is there anybody out there?Surely one of these people in the photo has a living relative (great grandkids, grandkids, etc) that might be able to shed some light on this photo.
2%Of the 47 people in the photo, only one is wearing glasses. Did the Ion Department require perfect vision of its workers?
My cueI don't even start listening to Christmas music until I see this picture reheated. It's a classic.
The Girl with the Curl -- and the candy cane. There once was a girl
with a pretty little curl
right in the middle of her forehead
When she was good
She was very, very good
and when she was bad
she was even better!
Re 2%The cigar smoker on the right in the three-button suit and the gent on his right both are holding eyeglasses, all the more to ratchet up their smashing good looks. Well, maybe just looks.
What's Left To Say?Besides their clothes and hair dos, two things that I’m glad have changed: The way Christmas trees look and protective coating for hardwood floors. And I’m guessing they had a White Elephant gift exchange, thus the whimsical gifts.
Raise your glassesI'm sure one of our more knowledgeable posters might know better, but I wonder if glasses were removed to prevent unwanted flash effects?
Could it be?I've looked at this photo for three Decembers now, and I just noticed that the girl sitting behind the girl with the striped blouse, and how much she looks like she could be Johnny Depp's great-grandmother.
Party TimeThe office parties and associated grab bags were created to give us all a chance to regift.
Allow me now to wish all of our Shorpy viewers, creators and commenters a very happy Holiday season. Let us all be well, prosper and keep returning to this wonderful site.
Love this photo....Like so many of you, I love it when this photo is trotted out! We are so drawn to it and love imagining what this party must have been like, the silly little gifts, the party girls, and those who just wanted it to all be over with so they could get back to work.
Each year I am struck by the lady behind the one in the striped blouse. She looks like she could have been in my high school annual from 1970. Yes, I dated myself there! Her hair style looks like it could have been from the 1970's, unlike her co-workers with their many finger waves. Keep posting this one, Dave....truly a classic!
An Evocative PhotographThe romance of old photographs is especially powerful in a picture like this. Studying the faces of what we assume are long departed strangers, we can't help speculating about the nature of their inner lives and how things turned out for them. Who ended up married to someone who made them happy or miserable? Which one(s) got ahead and who descended into poverty? Who died young - and so on?
With hindsight we know that only a few years after that Christmas party in 1925, the stock market crashed and the Great Depression began. Then World War II winnowed out a great many - how did this group of individuals make out through all those difficult times? There are many such questions which occur to the curious.
This is an extraordinarily evocative photograph. The transience of everything is plain to see in this picture if you notice such things.
This photois what prompted me to make an account on Shorpy. The first thing that jumped out at me was, is that a man in drag standing with his hand on the young lady's shoulder? The lady in question looks a bit like Drew Barrymore.
I noticed the indentations between the eyes of many of the men, and realized that they did take their glasses off for the photo, to minimize glare. No featherweight lenses in those days!
Tales from the Jazz AgeI'd like to take a crack at imagining who some of these people could be --
Oil Can Girl (seated at bottom, center) - Never turns down a chance to cut a rug at a speke. Very generous with the contents of her hip flask, which in a pinch can supply fuel for her sometime-boyfriend’s Hupmobile.
Desk Girl (seated at bottom, left) - Staring intently at a winged, two-horned leopard and wondering if she should jump up and scream at everybody to run for their lives.
Lace Collar Girl (two left from Oil Can Girl) - Wondering why Desk Girl is staring so intently at the office kitty-cat.
Time Warp Girl - (immediately above Desk Girl) - Up until a few weeks ago was a liberal arts major at an Ivy League university in the year 1969, then stumbled through a time portal into 1925. Decided to stay and get a job because, well, things are a lot less crazy here.
Starlet Girl - (above and to the right of Time Warp Girl) - Avid reader of Photoplay, Picture-Play, Screenland, Movie Weekly, Movie Mirror, and lots more. Passionately believes that her good looks could bring her fame in Hollywood, if only she could manage to stop tossing money away on magazines and save up for the train fare.
Hat Girl (immediately above Starlet Girl) - Took a few slugs from Oil Can Girl’s hip flask, now having trouble remembering her name.
Trashed Girl (immediately to the right of Hat Girl) - Took even more slugs from Oil Can Girl’s hip flask, but still conscious enough to realize that if she stops leaning on the girl below her, she’ll tumble to the floor.
Handsome Guy (standing in the back, left side, farthest left) - All the office girls have swooned over him at one time or another. Been engaged six times, but it always breaks off when he tells his bride-to-be that his mother will be living with them.
New Pretty Girl - (third from left, standing) - Just started work this past month. Soon to be Handsome Guy’s next ex-fiancee.
Wow, this is way too long already. Anyway, you get the idea. This is fun!
White Elephant Gift ExchangeI going with a White Elephant Gift Exchange for an Office Christmas Party. It explains the goofy gifts and the attire. Some of the exchanged presents still have tags on them.
No one seems to have noticedbut the shy guy in front of GO GO is none other than Irving Berlin, on a guided tour of the Western Electric facility and already evidencing the reclusiveness of his later years. At uppermost left, we have the mustachioed miscreant looking disdainfully at those beneath him, which is everyone. And finally, we have Grishkin at lowermost right left, a handsome woman whose lean and hungry look hath a troubled aspect not customarily associated with holiday gatherings (apart from those with family members present). She seems to have wandered in from one of those Russian plays that Ira Gershwin makes reference to.
All of which can only mean one thing - it's Christmas time here at Shorpy's. Greetings and salutations to all!
Times they don't changeThe women definitely place this picture in time by their clothes and hair. The men, especially the back row, center in photo, remind me of my father's photos of the late 1950's. It's all quite timeless.
Hey, long time listener, first time caller!I wonder if camp Pierce Brosnan (top row, far left) found the Ion Deptartment accepting of his flamboyant wonderfulness.
Festive DressThe bald gentleman in the back has the best holiday hat I have ever seen, the festive Go Go hat atop his bald head.
We need those names!The spectacular Massafornian colorized image should have some labels for the people in it.
So, here we go.
(Gimp and Python/PIL scripts did the job)
Thanks for the MemoriesThank you for publishing this picture again this year. It just doesn't seem right to not have these wonderful people wishing all of us a Merry Christmas. I wish all of the Shorpy readers and the Admins a Merry Christmas also.
Merry Christmas!I'm a faithful reader of Shorpy, have been for over 10 years now, since I joined up. Every year, I always look forward to the Shorpy Office Xmas Party picture. I don't know what it is; maybe it's the continuity of it. We know every year we'll see it, and every year we'll get to talk about new fictions we've created for the people therein. It's such great fun.
Re Office StoriesNice commentary! You really bring life to this party.
Glad for TradIt's truly a fun Shorpy-looker tradition to view this pic large and spend an hour time traveling and reading the comments. Hope everybody had a Groovy Solstice yesterday. Happy Holidays!
Hair dressersWho did the hair styles back then, terrible......
Sic transit ursusI love the Shorpy Christmas party! This guy still startled me when I spied him on the floor, despite the fact that I commented on him FIVE YEARS AGO.
Dean NorrisAh, it wouldn't be Christmas without this delight from Shorpy!
The guy behind the big boss's left shoulder looks like a sightly younger version of actor Dean Norris. According to IMDB, Dean Norris was born in 1962 or 1963, but if this post on Shorpy is any guide, he's at least 100 years old. Is he pretending to be younger than he really is? And what's the secret of looking so young?
Cheers!Thanks for posting again, this is one of my favourite pictures on Shorpy. Some odd Barnets going on with some of the women though...I'd love to know if there was a gramophone at this party and if so, what the playlist was.
Tradition I can almost hear Tevya, singing the song in "Fiddler On The Roof", but not quite. It is of course the Holiday Season, office parties and good will to men and of course women. It is time for us Shorpy Junkies to wish each other the best of the season. Good health, prosperity and peace to all. Thanks to our Hosts Dave and Ken and to our interlocutor terrace for their grand efforts.
G-manI had to do ctrl-f for all three pages, and I'm amazed that no one to date has identified J. Edgar Hoover standing in the front row, cigar butt in hand, between vest-and-watch chain guy and three-piece suit guy. I can't believe I didn't notice him when I first commented three years ago.
Time for a Shorpy Xmas party!I think we are overdue to have one where we all meet and discuss THIS picture (because with 150 comments, we clearly have a lot on our minds about this W.E. holiday soiree).
Merry Christmas ShorpyitesMerry Christmas to one and all, fans of the photos posted in Shorpy. Thanks to Dave and everyone who helps out with the site.
I hope the new year is good to all and everyone will be back next Christmas to view Xmas Party.
I've been a member for 3 years, 2 days and anonymous for several before that I think.
What's with the oil can?I understand the Teddy Bear and little house in the front of the photo. But what is the significance of the Christmas Oil Can?
[Yet another beloved Christmas legend inspired by this photo. -tterrace]
Do they know?The standing gal, 3rd from the left, and the kneeling gal (center and one row back) both have the same necklace on (7 little cascading chains ending in a pearl). I think that the boss-man, J. Edgar Hoover (on the right with the cigar), is having an affair with both of these gals and he gave them both the same necklace. He thinks it's really funny and smiles when he sees them together; his own little private joke! I wonder if the gals know and are just playing him for whatever they can get? We will never know for sure.
Modern Woman+89
One must wonder if oiling the bear will make the Yuletide bright?
Thanks again!This is now my official notification that the Xmas season has begun. The Office Party re-post.
Threadbare BoughsNow I know where Charlie Brown got his tree. Merry Christmas everyone!
Hours and hoursI, like so many others here, have spent hours with this image. I'm always drawn back to the woman in the lower left. She's always struck me as the office outcast trying to get out of the picture. The woman to the right of her, with the lace collar, looks like her boss giving her the stink eye for not participating.
Roaring Twenties!Thanks for this flash-back, Shorpy!
Love the very mysterious Lady on the left...
and still dislike that pompous guy with the cigar.
Wee fish, ewe, a mare, egrets, moose... and a hippo gnu year!
I have to askDoes "Office Xmas Party" have the largest amount of comments?
[That record might be held by Our Lady of Lourdes School. Another much-commented post was The Beaver Letter. - Dave]
FinallyShorpy's annual "Office Xmas Party" has arrived! There's my guy standing in the back row, far left still waiting for me. Swoon.
Happy Holidays, Shorpyites!
And thank you, Dave, for all that you do.
Re 2%, and Raise your glassesI think glasses were considered unattractive. I remember lots of members of this generation (my grandparents') or the next who would whip off their glasses whenever someone raised a camera.
Tough Day At The Office?The best part about these office parties are the grab bags. It's always the best way to regift. Other than that, I hope Dave, Ken, tterace and all our outstanding commentators and readers have a wonderful holiday and a healthy prosperous New Year.
Must have been a heck of a partyAll the way in the back is a tall bald man with a traffic signal on his head! That's better than a lampshade. The body language between the woman on the far left and the woman to her right who is glaring at her is really very sad. You wonder what sort of ugliness was going on behind the scenes. The lady looks like she's been crying a bit. Who knows. It's fascinating to see such a candid photo none the less.
An oilcan!Now I know the perfect gift to get for all my co-workers. Merry Christmas Shorpy nation.
I look forward to these people each yearThey've become familiar yet remain interesting. As I said years ago, we're testing the counter on this one.
Merry Christmas fellow Shorpyites and wish a grand New Year!
It was ninety years ago today ...... and the photo never ceases to give.
The fun is overOkay, we had our Christmas celebration, now everyone back to your desks and let's finish out the day at 5:00.
The lucky onesDue to the magic of photography, this happy group has been celebrating now for ninety years. If you enlarge the picture and study their faces and demeanors, you may get some insight into their characters and personalities in 1925. After seeing this photo for many Christmases on Shorpy, I almost feel that I know some of them as well I know my own friends. Merry Christmas to all, especially the Shorpy staff.
What are we missing?Great photo, been seeing it for years now, but I always wonder what else was going on? People are looking left, right, straight, up, down. What was going on out of frame? That lady in lower left looks ready to bolt, especially with the other lady looking on concernedly. If this was a Halloween photo, the massacre would be about to begin.
I've been ill, and maybe delirious...
Spooky Lady of Christmas PastI remain endlessly curious regarding the woman with her back to the desk.
Spooky and haunting, amid all the fascinating characters in this classic shot, she is The One.
Department Name for Room 504Western Electric Company
Installation Department
5th Floor
1319 F Street
Washington DC
(From the 1925 Washington City Directory)
This department installed Central Office equipment (testboards, operator switchboards, signaling equipment, etc) supporting both local and long distance telephone service.
Google street view has an office building that looks old enough to be our Christmas Office party location. Perhaps another Shorpyite can add the street view for us.
[It was built in 1913. Interestingly enough, it's just one building away from Harris & Ewing, another source of many Shorpy photos. -tterrace]
Merry Christmas, George BabbittThe guy on the right, in front, with the grand forehead, holding the stogie, reminds me of Sinclair Lewis's protagonist in "Babbitt" (1922):
"He was the modern business man; one who gave orders to clerks and drove a car and played occasional golf and was scholarly in regard to Salesmanship. His head suddenly appeared not babyish but weighty, and you noted his heavy, blunt nose, his straight mouth and thick, long upper lip, his chin overfleshy but strong; with respect you beheld him put on the rest of his uniform as a Solid Citizen."
Room 504Flip the photo horizontally, and you will see that we are on the 5th floor. Who can guess the "department" we are in?
Now it is Christmastime for sureI couldn't truly celebrate Christmas without seeing this picture again. It must be after Thanksgiving or Shorpy would not have posted it. Any comments I could make about this picture would only be a pale response to all the previous comments. It just makes me try to think what an office Christmas party like this must have been compared to a modern day party. I look forward to this picture every year for some crazy reason.
294408That's how many people have called up this photo. Over a quarter million! And this isn't YouTube. What an amazing picture. What an amazing site. Merry Christmas to all my Shorpy comrades and a huge thank-you to Dave and tterrace for all they do to bring this amazingness to us every day.
YuletideI heard Springsteen singing about Santa on my way to work, and now I see this. It is truly Christmastime now.
Oh, Beautiful Lady in the Lower Left......let me unwrap that bear for you, before your nearby friend gets more worried that you're not having any fun.
DoppelgangerThe young woman framed in the door on the left looks remarkably like today's woman who was a business partner of mine.
Nothing but the best at Shorpy!!Thanks for this expected post!
Never noticed this beforeThe men's jackets have creases running the length of the arms. I wonder if this was a customary thing for "the office" or typical treatment "of the times" for pressing? Perhaps this treatment was typical only of a worsted fabric?
P. D. Police Dept.I keep being intrigued by the one and only joker in the crowd, our lady with the "P.D. Police ...." hat. There must be another word after "Police," I suppose it is just "Dept."
Marching In PlaceSeeing this picture so many times tells me that I'm growing older but these celebrants have become ageless. Along with that piece of wisdom allow me to add my Seasonal Greetings for a Merry Christmas, a joyous Hanukkah Past and a Happy, Healthy and Prosperous New Year to all. Of course we are all in the debt of Dave,Ken and tterrace (who may or may not be on the Payroll) for their addictive posts, explanations and comment rebuttals.
From NYC, where the Christmas Eve Fahrenheit is forecasted at 72º.
Mel
[tterrace is salaried, deals in a service and is bigger than a bread box. -John Charles Daly]
Life of the partyMy best guess for "life of the party" status goes to the lady in front with elf buckles on her shoes. I love this image- there so much detail and depth of relational perspective.
Afterlife Office PartyThis photograph has become a holiday tradition for me, as anticipated as my Christmas eve tradition of baking cookies, wrapping gifts and gently placing a dish towel under Uncle Trouble's chin so he doesn't drool on his good shirt after passing out on the couch.
Scanning the full-screen photo, I wonder if a small corner of the afterlife might be populated by tenants doomed to spend eternity at a perpetual office Christmas party for some workplace sin like stealing lunches from the office fridge, pilfering office supplies, or failing to replace paper or toner in the printer. I can picture Dickensian clarks with ink-stained fingers forever mingling over paper-cupped eggnog with 60's swinging secretaries, Old Kingdom robed Egyptian scribes trimming the tree with bored mid-level Qing Dynasty bureaucrats, and that impenetrable knot of young IT guys and gals speaking in that techno-babble, side-eyeing the boss, forever giggling.
I imagine the mirthless rounds of the eternal white elephant gift exchange: the Take Me to the River-singing fish going round and round and round the conference table ad infinitum. I can see the everlasting greasy pile of stale taquitos, timeless sips from the bottle of booze hidden in the file cabinet, Starbucks Christmas Jazz CD playing in an endless loop -- the horror.
Goober Pea
UpdatedUsing John J's sleuthing on the location of this office, I recently ventured there to see if any resemblance to the photo remains. I got as far as the only door in the hall on that floor. Nothing appeared to remain.
Seek and ye shall find . . . GO!TimeAndAgainPhoto, that's a great job of investigating one of our Shorpy.com favorites, but I'm convinced that if you'll just badge your way into that office, you'll find a fellow in there with a traffic signal on his head.
I hope so, anyway.
Re: Seek and ye shall find . . . GO!Jim Page - I had to badge my way past security and up the elevator before I was stopped by the secured door.
Those were the daysI really do miss the office Christmas parties from my working years which gave us an opportunity to meet, greet and schmooze with people we hadn't seen in 20 minutes. Merry Christmas to all, rejoice and be glad.
Every Year and I am Still Captivated But I Don't Know WhyThanks Dave, I'm still enjoying this for some reason I don't understand, and I'm still curious about the front and center oil can.
SNL Time Traveler?That person standing directly to the left of the tree is either a time-traveling, cross-dressing Pete Davidson from SNL or his Great Grandmother worked at Western Electric Group in 1925!
Shorpy - I look forward to this picture every year and am a regular viewer of your site. Even have a couple of large prints on my walls at home, with another coming soon!
Thanks for this site - it's one of the pleasures of my day!
Yuletide.I love seeing this picture every year. As do my co-workers. Thank you.
I have seen this picture for six (I believe) years nowBut today, today there is a new face, one I instantly recognize, that I would swear was not there in any previous year.
I once found my wife's doppleganger (Trackless Trolley) in one of these pictures. Today, I find my youngest daughter, Cecilia (16); she's poking her face out between the 2nd and 3rd fully visible women on the left side of the photo (their right) from the tree.
Ok, it's spooky Dave.... but I'm starting to believe someone has a time travel machine, and everyone but me in my family is using it.
P.D. clocheWonder what she's hiding under that hat?
It's timeThis picture (and the myriad comments) are so entertaining, I sometimes search for it when I'm feeling low, even in July! I especially love Oil Can Sally's come hither look.
I amost know these peopleMy Great-Great Grand uncle was Dan Richardson, a senior accountant for Western Electric in the New England/Northeast US area. He certainly visited Washington D. C. during his time with Western Electric, and would have met and worked with one or more of the people in this photo.
Odd to think I could, via relatives, have been introduced to these people.
This is my first ChristmasI see 26 men, 21 women and hundreds of possibilities.
Oh My GoodnessI had no idea it was so close to Christmas. We really need to finish the baking...
Old Friends From The OfficeAre like warm Gluehwein to heat the cold heart at Christmas.
Merry Christmas my Shorpyite friends and a Happy New Year to everyone, especially Dave who keeps all of us in memories. [updated]
Phyllis Diller"What I don't like about office Christmas parties is looking for a job the next day."
QuorumThis picture puts the "mass" back in Christmas.
Sturdy DesksI guess the nine guys head and shoulders above everyone else are standing on two or three of these desks. Curious as anyone about the office relationships and the lady sitting in front of the desk. My eighth year of wondering and guessing about this picture.
The scraggly looking treein the picture most probably was bought with donations from some of the people in this picture.
Older Shorpyites will no doubt remember the single set of lights on the tree. The lighting "outfit" was an inexpensive 8 light series set, with C-6 miniature based bulbs. When a bulb burned out, it was time to hunt for it with a good one...unscrewing every bulb in the set until it was found.
I remember helping my grandmother do just that. For some reason, the C-6 series set was always at the top of the tree. Grandma would get up on a stool, with me holding the good bulb, and switching it one by one until the set lit.
Wonderful times. Timeless memories.
What Are They ThinkingI've enjoyed this picture year after year, and like many who had suffered through office parties, I often thought what goes through their minds.
Click to enlarge.
Lady in the foregroundI've also wondered (several years in a row) about the lady with her back to the desk. The thing that really stands out to me, is her hair. As far as I can tell, she has her hair swept back in a bun, which is clearly very old-fashioned compared to all the bobbed and shingled ladies in the office.
I know this is a bit far-fetched but her clothes and hair suggest to me that she wasn't an office worker, as they give the impression of having less money to spend on herself. I wondered if maybe she was the office cleaner/ tea lady who was called in to be part of the photo?
It could explain why she seems a bit distant from all the others in the group.
It's here! It's here!The Shorpy Christmas Cheer office party picture is here! Smack dab in the middle of Prohibition, the gang at Western Electric make merry with two or three hundred stories or thoughts about what the heck was going on in their heads!
My favorite is the seductress "oil can" Sally with her bathtub-gin induced come-hither gaze!
Merry Christmas!
#UsTooI bet if those girls had a voice today there would be some explaining to do.
Night Before ChristmasWhen what to my wondering eyes should appear
but a company Christmas calendar, the same as last year.
Season's GreetingsThis is simply the greatest captured moment in the history of office photography!
Nothing puts me in the spirit like --this pic, a glass of egg nog and Darlene Love's "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)" on a loop! Merry Christmas all!!
The distant gazeAs fun as it is, I think we're way overthinking the motives of the 5 or so "looking away" women. Yes, even the comment-generating pair of the sultry one in the lower left corner and the one sitting to her left who appears to be staring her down. It was evidently fashionable for many decades for women to "look into the distance" for a portrait photograph, and I think that's all they're doing here. My theory is that this practice started as a way to prevent the "zombie eyes" effect of the exposure capturing the blink after the flash. My mother always did it, even when I implored her to look at my camera with everyone else.
That GirlIn the middle front, her hairdo reminds me of a poem my mother (b. 1915) used to recite:
There was a little girl who had a little curl,
Right in the middle of her forehead.
And when she was good, she was very, very good,
But when she was bad, she was horrid.
[Nursery rhyme by Longfellow. - Dave]
Every yearI feel sorrier than the year before for the one sitting on the floor with her back to the desk. She looks like she is just waiting for the party to be over so she can throw herself out the window.
Reminds me of "The Office"I can find the whole cast from Dunder-Mifflin -- Michael, Jim and Pam, Dwight Schrute, Stanley, Kevin, Angela, and Phyllis.
Let's danceHey, did anyone remember to bring their Lasses White albums?
ClaireThis pretty gal looks exactly like my wife. I just printed out the image and am going to show her tonight.
Work or PleasureIs the machine on the desk at the right (above the In Box) a record player brought in? A radio? Or is it merely some office device like maybe a phone-related routing/switchboard machine?
Also, wingtips apparently were in style.
Sure SignOf the Season: this picture on Shorpy (Thanks, Dave) and "A Christmas Carol" on TCM. All the best to all wherever ye might be!
Ghosts of Christmas pastIt really is curious that we can scrutinize a picture like this every year and each time we notice something different that we did not notice before. This year, while observing enlarged close-ups of these people's faces, I see resemblances to many of my own acquaintances, friends and public figures and one can almost even determine the personality and attitude of each person. I think the young lady standing on the extreme left, second row, closest to the door, looks like a younger Martha Stewart. I also know that these happy holiday office parties are quickly disappearing due to the current lawsuits involving harassment, etc. so the people of my generation (old fossils) can move into the history books with them and just remember how it "used to be" and know it will never be again.
This festive group gets a prime spot in that chapter and exemplifies what it was like, for better or for worse. Party on kids, 'til the end of time.
The BossThe one sure thing about this photo is who the boss is, probably flanked by his second in command to his right.
Ion Dept. XmasI have followed this wonderful Xmas photo for years but have never commented, till now. I always wondered what I might say, since so much has been said. But what really made me start this year -- the thing I’d never really noticed before – the new thing! – is that guy (head) craning behind the Xmas tree. Compared with all the other people, he’s really only half there, penciled in, lacking in the vibrancy and heft of every other person. So I guess my comment is: Merry Xmas, Ion Tree guy! (And Merry Xmas to all my Shorpy sisters and brothers, and of course to our all-puissant but beneficent overlords, Dave and tterrace, who make this daily joy available to us all.)
[Or maybe Ion Guy is just tinseled in. - Dave]
Was the Electric Company a Communist Front?Psychodramas? How about it looks like Alger Hiss and Whitiker Chambers’ cousins were exchanging Christmas gifts in Washington in 1925. Alger’s stands to the left and Whitiker’s to the right—significant? Whitiker’s cousin looks like someone socked him on the forehead and Alger’s has a smile on his face.
[Ahem. Whittaker, not "Whitiker." - Dave]
That Temptress!All these folks saying they see something new each year -- nuts. I first laid eyes on the beauty behind the oil can, what -- a decade ago now? And she has had me in her spell ever since. It is now officially Christmas season for me.
I'm busy here!You Shorpyites who fantasize about folks from over 90 years ago -- How strange you are.
And all your blather is distracting me from my mission of saving the saintly Love of My Life whose shoulder had been latched onto by the Evil Witch with no opposable thumb ...
I must complete this pesky time machine before Christmas.
Holiday RomanceI see that its time to renew my holiday romance. Every year I fall in love with the young lady the farthest to the left. Brings warmth to my heart, of course, I don't dare tell my wife.
Season's Greetings!I look forward to this picture every year. I like that it's been a running thing here for so long, because I see it as a way to bind all us Shorpyites together. No matter where we live, how old we are, what we're doing in our lives, we can all stop here and comment on this picture, wishing everyone a wonderful holiday. Thank you, Dave, for providing that for us.
I wish all of you that read this a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. May 2019 be the year you've been waiting for.
Hip FlasksEven the Bear won't tell, but, I am sure the oil can will.
1925! Prohibition! Almost every woman had one and, I am sure, that there may be a few here.
Maybe, that's why Gladys sitting with the Bear and oil can, is smiling knowingly?
Even the person who introduced Prohibition had a still in his basement.
"It was 93 years ago today" Happy Christmas, John! Happy Christmas, Yoko!...Esther, Mary, Eugenia, Mabel, Nellie, Ida, Clara, Edith, Winifred, Maude, Violet, Gladys, Daisy,Doris, Agatha, Gertrude, Elspeth, Velma, Thelma, Myrna, Hortence...
The LevelingTo paraphrase William Makepeace Thackeray "It was in the reign of President Calvin Coolidge, that the above-named personages lived and quarrelled ; good or bad, handsome or ugly, rich or poor, they are all equal now."
Most popular galMy favorite - Oil Can Sally - has three gag gifts displayed. That probably makes her the most popular woman in the office. In addition, her provocative smile suggests a hangover was in her future!
Still GOGO after all these yearsI love the bald guy just visible in the back row with the traffic signal "ballanced" perfectly on the top of his head. Very steady!
It sounds crazy... but I swear the bear moved a bit since last year.
That old gang is back!The Christmas Party Picture is back! I'd actually forgotten about it, so a quick check of Shorpy was the most welcome way to end my Friday. The week to come will reveal new snarks about these buddies of ours, and I look forward to that. Thank you, Shorpy!
Those EyesThe beauty sitting against the desk gets me every year. She looks exhausted.
My Favorite TraditionI don't post a lot of comments, but I check the site every day to see what's new and to read what *other* people have said. This is probably one of my favorite posts on this site because it's great to go back through the years of comments and read people's observations about the image, maybe see if someone has come up with something new. I hope we keep seeing this picture on the Friday before Christmas until the heat death of the universe. It would be a lovely constant.
Happy Holidays to everyone at Shorpy. I hope it's filled with love, contentment, and joy.
If you like this photo ...You loved the Shorpy.com postcard you just received!!!
When mine came in the mail, my wife said, "Do you know those people?"
OF COURSE I DO!!!
Find the BossI just love the way he stands there holding his cigar. You can almost hear him barking out orders in a very Edward G. Robinson-ish voice.
This reminds me of --That photo in "The Shining" of the 1921 New Year's Eve party at the Overlook Hotel. These folks will be back, again and again.
The timeless shorpy traditionEvery year when I see the office party pic, my eyes always wind up gazing into the sideways glance of that beauty in front of the desk.
I cant help imagining what the conversations of the day were, who brought a flask full of illegal libations, was jazz coming from a tube type radio, did everyone get a little Christmas bonus (it was the roaring 20's mind you), and who has a crush on who?
Dave, thanks for all you do. Shorpy is a constant in my day.
Be well everyone!
I guessed the right number of buttons in the jarMerry Christmas!
The Shorpy Ion Dept.A crazy thought occurred to me this year with respect to this beloved standard photograph: what if it were not the Ion Dept. from 1925 but the Shorpy regular contributors from 2019? Which one is Dave? Where is tterrace? And what about so many of the devoted Shorpsters (in no special order) – Jim Page, fanhead, TheGeezer, PhotoFan, Baxado, BethF, TimeAndAgainPhoto, Vintagetvs, OTY, Solo, Jeb70, switzarch, DaveA, JennyPennifer, rhhardin, pennsylvaniaproud, JohnHoward, kines, loujudson, lindab, Jano, StefanJ, jimmylee42, Hayslip, rivlax, Mattie, joemanning, Born40YearsTooLate, GarandFan, mountainrev, perpster, Dbell, Doubleclutchin, Root 66, KathyRo, archfan, GlenJay, alexinv, karenfryxell, Gooberpea, Angus J, 510Russ, Michael R, Brett, BillyB, bobzyerunkl, Alex, jsmakbkr, Marchbanks, Commishbob, Jimmy Longshanks, DoninVa, mgolden, Alonzo, Dag, Juan de la cruz, bobstothfang, Ice gang, Rute Boye, Vonderbees, Ad Orientem, MacKenzie Kavanaugh, JazzDad, Maniak Productions, EvenSteven, Doghouse Riley, John.Debold, Sewickley, Paul A, and jd taylor. And let’s not forget some of the people we haven’t seen for a while: stanton_square, aenthal, Mr Mel. (My apologies to those I have not listed.) Best of the season to you all, my fellow Shorpsters!
Who's WhoDavid K - Dave runs the joint, so he's the three piece with the cigar. TTerrace is his major player on this site, so he is the guy looking over Dave's left shoulder. Now we just need someone to post a picture with numbers, and we label them.
Maligayang Pasko all.
Re:Shorpy Ion Dept@davidk, I'm the one peeking from behind the Christmas tree.
I hope everyone in the Shorpy pantheon enjoys all the holidays!
Postcards From The EdgeWhen I got mine, I literally jumped for joy seeing the people that I love and cherish so much. Now I can look at them anytime throughout the year, not just at Christmas.
And, thank you to DAVIDK for the mention.
[@davidk, I would be the guy with the object upon his head]
Our own office partyI love seeing this photo every year and thanks to davidk for the guest book entries of our office. Top of the season everyone!
Still HereEvery time I see this picture I think that these people could have been my mom or dad.The time and ages represented are almost perfect. It reminds me of aunts and uncles and family friends who are long gone although I will never forget them. I just turned 80 years old this past July and can remember a lot of people who would have been right at home in this picture. Thank you davidk for including me in your list of people who have liked this picture in the past and a big Merry Christmas to Dave and tterrace for maintaining the site.
This one never gets oldHow is it that an old picture never gets old? Every year, I always notice something new that I hadn't noticed before. This year it's the guy with the beard, hiding behind the tree.
Also, the woman just above and just to the left of the woman in the striped blouse (her left, that is) - could that be Johnny Depp's great-grandmother? I see a definite resemblance.
Merry Christmas everyone!
Love itI love this photo. The expressions, the faces. Some of the women are quite attractive. The man with his hand draped across the shoulder of another man is interesting.
Office desk sultry beautyI wonder why the dark hair beauty is staring off to the side? Was she jilted? Was she sick of the many advances by the suited men, or despondent that the one she wanted got away. Why does the women in the RBG collar stare at her? Does she know what happened?
I love the captions from another commenter.
Michael ScottIf Michael Scott were the manager of this office, I wonder if he would have said (as he did 85 years later on the TV show), "Unbelievable. I do the nicest thing that anyone's ever done for these people and they freak-out. Well happy birthday Jesus, sorry your party's so lame."
Merry Christmas, Shorpy! And for the record, I don't consider this a lame birthday party, and I doubt Jesus would, either.
Bal MasqueNinety-five years later, if there even would be a party! With an added suspense -- what does Hermione look like, under that mask?
Socially DistantWould they have believed it had someone told them that in 95 years their photograph would be the highlight of 2020 for a group of remote observers?
Merry and BrightThis photo has become the official kickoff of the holidays for me.
Best wishes to all the Shorpy regulars and particularly those who keep this place running.
Neither here nor thereEach year my attention is drawn immediately to the three beauties at the bottom left of the photo: sultry beauty far left floor level, looking off to her right at someone/something off camera; the lady to that lady's left who seems to be watching her with deliberate intent; exquisite beauty just behind the desk corner, beheld with what appears to be fond regard by the lady just behind her to her left; and wholesome beauty smiling behind exquisite beauty, being kept tabs on by the lady in the Police Department helmet.
I do eventually get past these women, to study the remainder of visages and postures and wonder about the other long-dead revelers of both genders, but it is these six who take up most of my time each year as I wonder what might have been the complexities of the various relationships. And as always, I hope each one in the photo had a Merry Christmas that year and many years after. I know that the likelihood is slim to none that all lived long and were carefree throughout, but that's still what I wish for in this suspended moment that so many have celebrated for so long, thanks to Shorpy.
So a Merry Christmas to beloved Shorpy and its erudite, esteemed company of gazers no less fascinating than any who attended Office Xmas Party: 1925.
Thanks Again Dave and Merry ChristmasThanks again Dave, I've been waiting for it. Obviously, we all love this yearly Christmas "surprise". I enjoy everyone's take on this party I missed awhile back.
Questions, questionsEvery year I wonder.
What is that thing on the postal scale? A misplaced elf? A misshapen magus?
Why is that woman with the oil can looking at me? Am I safe?
And why is the Christmas tree so scrawny?
Merry Christmas Dave!And to all the crew at Shorpy! Thanks for the memories and keeping some of us sane in 2020!
What I want for ChristmasI don't care what it is, I want one.
[Update, thanks to all the gizmo identifiers. I love tape dispensers! Now I really want it!]
Nothing stops this partyOh, thank goodness the Shorpy party is still on! It's the only event the pandemic cannot cancel!
Judging youDon't know what got into her holiday spirit. Not too pleased with someone.
Re: tterrace What I want for ChristmasIt's a gummed tape dispenser, similar to this one:
https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/antique-vintage-ornate-cast-iron-...
She of the averted gazeI know that we enjoy interpreting what is in - or not in - this photograph each year. However, eight people, including "she of the averted gaze" are looking in that direction, suggesting something was going on while the picture was taken, sufficient to distract. A further basis for interpretation and speculation, perhaps? Merry Christmas.
Only one bow tieAmong all those Windsor knots on the gents, third on upper right. In group after group they are always in the minority, even until today.
Going to a Go-GoNothing says Christmas like a Go-Go party hat.
That machineMay be a gummed tape applicator.
National Package Sealer model #206
Do they know?Do you think the two women wearing the exact same necklace (dripping pearls) suspect that it might have come from the same man? Are the pearls from the handsome young gentleman with the pen sticking out of his pocket? Is this an early version of "The Bachelor" that we are witnessing? Which one will he choose?
Austerity Christmas?From the Charlie Brown Christmas tree to the lack of any visible food or drinks (except for a few candy canes) to the blank, unimpressed looks on some faces, it looks like an Austerity Christmas in Anytown this year.
Well, Merry Christmas TermiteYou can probably still find one somewhere. It's an automatic wetter and cutter for wide, brown packing tape. You just mash down on the handle and it shoots out a measured length of wet sticky tape and cuts it when you release. There is a messy water reservoir up front. I used one in a shipping department in 1974.
Buddha Bear!Puts in his once a year appearance.
Merry Christmas to Dave & Ken & tterrace and all the naughty boys & girls at Shorpy!
Nice $-value todayThat horse that guy in front of Christmas tree is holding. All with bit of wear and patina collected in 95 years.
Another yearWe all get another year older and they stay the same.
Five groupsPart of the endless fun with this photo is deciding which part of it to center as the embiggened image on my screen. I fluctuate between the five main Ion Dept. groups: on the left, the ladies on the floor, the ladies standing, and the men standing above them, and on the right, the lower men and the upper men. (If I had to distinguish a special sub-group, it would be solo guy behind the tree and the fellow on the very far right who hovers between the upper and lower groups.) Once I have the group du jour embiggened, I focus on the individual characters. As we who have been doing this for years well know, that’s when the fun begins.
Might I take this opportunity to offer the best of the season to Dave and Ken and tterrace and all my fellow Shorpsters. In this extraordinary year of greater screen time than ever before, I find that my Shorpy screen time is even more intense and valuable, if such a thing is actually possible. Bless Shorpy, and bless you all.
Elbow to elbowEvery year I have a different response to this photograph, depending on general mood and the state of the world. This year, I truly envy those people. They get to stand together in a bunch, breathing one another’s air, touching each other casually, sharing food and drink, simply going in to work at an office. They all lived through a plague of their own six years earlier, and they look fine now, so there’s hope.
Happy holidays to all the people who create and enjoy this wonderful website that gives me joy and perspective on a daily basis.
Re: Elbow to elbowI must concur. Having spent nine months wearing a mask, practically bathing in hand sanitizer every time I touch anything, and staying as far removed from people I don't live with as humanly possible, I'm jealous of these long-dead coworkers for being able to crowd together, enjoying one another's company in person, rather than over Zoom or FaceTime.
It's been a bad, bad year, there's no denying that, but Shorpy has been a bright spot in my day since January, much as I'm sure it's been for the rest of you. Happy Holidays to all the Shorpyites out there — may you find some contentment and peace in the face of all this tragedy and come out the other side hale and hearty.
That Time of Year AgainThrough the miracle of photography and our friends at Shorpy, we are able to visit this party again.
A Vintage CrumpleAfter all these annual viewings I finally noticed what looks like a lone crumpled piece of paper at lower right. We'll never know what was on it. Maybe a dig at one of these people? Or love note? Ah, the mysteries!
Christmas Past, Present, and Future all at once!Every year I wonder about the dark-haired smiling young woman third from the front, beside the desk. With her modern-looking bob, she looks like a Time Traveler, so that's what I've named her. (Not far away are The Maniac, Da Boss, and The Very Secret Lovers.) This photo, along with its subjects, never gets old, and I hope the Holiday Spirit that originally inspired it never does either. Happiest of Holidays to everybody who produces and sees Shorpy, and a New Year of peace, love, courage, and good health to all.
12 Years of ChristmasMerry Christmas Shorpy. Thanks for the memories.
[This is Shorpy's 14th Christmas! - Dave]
PerspectiveThey all lived through a plague of their own six years earlier, and they look fine now, so there’s hope.
Thanks, jdtaylor--I'm sure I'm not the only one who needed that perspective today.
Happy holidays to Dave and all the Shorpyites. This site has been a great distraction lately!
Time to Move OnI vote that next year you post the 1926 photo. Some of the lingering issues must have been resolved by then.
The X-mas Party Presents!And here you may have a look on how Christmas looked 100 years ago in the U.K. (including a display of toys made by Meccano in the toy department of Whiteleys store in Bayswater).
Mysterious machineNow that the gummed tape dispenser has been identified, I hope someone will be able to reveal the secret of the machine on the desk behind the in-box. A perforator or a mimeograph machine perhaps?
[It's called a typewriter. - Dave]
Dead ringer, etc.At the very back and far left - the attractive woman 3 in - I have a friend who looks exactly like her but with a more modern hair style, but identical facial features. How eerie!
Something tells me that Oil Can Mary's wicked smile indicates that she is already planning what flapper attire she will wear at the local speakeasy that night. Her future toast might be: "My candle burns at both ends; It will not last the night; But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends— It gives a lovely light!" Published in 1920. Edna St. Vincent Millay.
I often wonder what became of all these people. It is my hope that they all lived long, happy, prosperous lives but alas, as we know, life can be more complicated than that.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year you ghosts of Christmas past!
The only Christmas party I'll go to.Merry Christmas to Dave and the Shorpy Crew, as well as my fellow Shorpy followers. It appears that I've been around for 12.5 of the 14 years of Shorpy.com, though it seems like yesterday and DoninVa no longer lives in Va. There's always something to be found in a Shorpy photo: the young woman framed in the glass of the door is the doppelganger for someone I once worked with. Cheers!
Newcomer To The PartyAfter viewing Shorpy for some years now, I finally decided to join this party; I'm in awe of the many observations, and for now, am unable to come up with any new angles on this fascinating photo. I do want to say that the comments of jd taylor and BethF most definitely struck a chord with me; I, too, envy those in the photo, survivors of even greater trouble, coming as it did following The Great War. Hope to see you all back at the party next year, and a few other places along the way. May you all find peace and hopefully some joy this Christmas.
A Merry Christmas to You All!It's been a rough few years for me (family deaths, health issues), and my Internet usage dropped off considerably. I may have stopped commenting, but I never stopped reading, and I've looked forward to this photo every year for a long, long time. I'm glad that for all the things in flux in this world, the Shorpy Office Xmas Party remains the same.
I wish you and yours the very merriest and happiest of holiday seasons. May your days be merry and bright, and may all your Christmases be white. :-D
EerieWhy the rush?
[??? - Dave]
MassafornianWhat a great comment, thank you. I’ve never colorized, and I use Photoshop for barely 10% of what it can do, but I truly appreciated your insight into the process. More amazing is that you’ve named them all. Gosh, I’d love to know who the others are, in addition to Mary, Bobbie, Lulu, and Lila. And how honest to share with us your faves, Mary and Bobbie, made legit by your wife asking. I agree about Lila: trouble. Also the lady with the marcel wave in the purple dress and blue coat with fur fringe behind the bear and oilcan and house: you might think of her in off moments but you could never make it work. (What’s her name?) Thanks for explaining about Remini because I wondered how their teeth and various other features were so brilliant and precise. And don’t worry about the rouging: it raised the temperature on the whole event (and not just on the ladies – it’s perfect for that guy third from the left in the upper right, the older fellow with the red tie, who’s had too much to drink or is about to have a stroke or both). One more thing: I’d never really noticed that unsightly blotch on the forehead of the boss with the cigar – you did it full, gross justice. Again, great job, and thanks, man!
I'd like to be the first this yearSurely, it's not too soon for this Yuletide Jewel ...
The Oilcan Need an explanation for the purpose of the oil can at the party.
[It's not a party unless everyone is well-lubricated. - Dave]
Now the season is complete!I look forward to revisiting this every year. Thank you!
- Ken
Colorized versionI've been working off and on to colorize this wonderful image throughout the year. Here's the result. You can also find it here in high resolution:
http://www.hearthworks.net/1925/1925_office_xmas_party_12.12.jpg
Merry Christmas!
[Bravo! - Dave]
Amazing colorization!@ Massafornian -- thanks so much for that epic job. It adds so much to an already incredible image. (Judging by your username, I suspect we are compatriots -- I was born in Massachusetts and live in California.)
Merry and BrightWith retirement, our lives have been simpler here so the Christmas decorations go up earlier and earlier. But it isn't *really* the season until the annual Shorpy office party. Happy Holidays to Dave and the regular contributors that make this place special.
BTW...it's kind of odd that I get older but none of the partygoers ever seem to. Must be something in the eggnog.
As We Seek Normalcy, This Pic Provides it!The last two pandemic driven years, makes most of us seek glimpses of normalcy. Having this Christmas tradition each year, having a peek into the office Christmas party, gives a moment of that peace. Knowing these, and their children, and their grandchildren...made it through the Great Depression, WWll, the Cold War, etc., etc., still, a moment frozen in time, gives a certain reassurance, that everything is going to be ok!
Merry Christmas, office party, as well as all the Shorpy members that crash the party each year!
Bravo, indeedWell done on the colorization, Massafornian. It adds a level of vibrancy to an already-lively photo of an intriguing bunch of people. I’m also surprised at some of the effects, for example the oft-commented-upon woman in the lower left, sitting against the desk, craning her neck for a beady glare offstage – the rouge on her cheeks and the lipstick blunt the ultra-crazy impression and make her look, dare I say, somewhat fetching. Thank you for your addition to this seasonal favourite. And best of the season to my fellow Shorpsters and to the toilers in the digital mines who bring us this much-loved website.
Everybody's back in the officeNobody's working from home and the party is ON! Happy holidays!
WFHAs we head into Covid Christmas #2, it again strikes me that these folks would have no idea what working from home would even mean. (Taking in sewing?) Here they are, in joyous proximity one to the other, while we are still asked to distance, mask up, etc. Their mingled exhalations, their casual touches, the humid density of their gathering – how I envy them. Well, we come here to dream and fantasize, don’t we? Happy holidays to my fellow dreamers and observers and to the hard-working trio who bring us the stuff that dreams are made of.
Up to good or no goodI am incredulous that I have never really noticed the girl at the far left of the photo, just in front of the door -- the last of the women. She is concealing something. Knowledge or intent, benevolent or nefarious ... no matter. Keep a weather eye on that one.
Egad! New versions!Shorpy Patreon members have been treated to a short, elegant--well, creepy--music video in Ken-Burns-goes-Edward Gorey style. And now a colorized photo with costumes straight out of Technicolor heaven. And in 2021 they all sneaked in to party on Saturday!
Old FriendsI've seen this picture so many times over the years at Christmas time on Shorpy that the faces have become like familiar old friends. I'm of the opinion that Christmas will never be the same for me unless I get to see this photo at least once during the Christmas season.
Girl At The Far LeftNo one tried to say a thing
When they took him out in jest
Except, of course, the little neighbor boy
Who carried him to rest
And he just walked along, alone
With his guilt so well concealed
And muttered underneath his breath
“Nothing is revealed”
Time For A Rhyme...or TwoIt's Christmas Party time again, so back to yesteryear,
To faces from so long ago, we now hold somewhat dear
They lived through their pandemic, and now we've had our own
For some, it was an ordeal; of much more time alone,
Yet, gazing at these faces here shows us things will improve,
And then to next year's gala even more will gladly move!
A Merry Christmas to you all, here at this special time
I thank you all so very much for bearing with my rhymes,
May next year's party be the one our current trial's behind us
But our friends from 1925 will be there to remind us ...
A very special thanks to Massafornian for the superb colorization!
A bit more on the colorizationThe colorization was done by hand, for about an hour most every morning, when I had the spare time while listening to podcasts. I started in early January and completed it around April. I am sure that most Shorpians know that colorization is tedious, mostly due to the need to mask objects and details as much as possible, to distinguish them from other objects. (The Christmas tree with its fir needles and tinsel was a bit of a job). Automated colorization just doesn’t compare in quality to doing it by hand.
Each person is a smart layer in Photoshop that in turn contains many layers of isolated bits to colorize. The fun part was choosing the colors of people’s attire. Hopefully what I chose is close enough to what this cast of characters might’ve actually worn in 1925, but I won’t claim any historical research was performed for color accuracy.
I could easily spend the same amount of time on this image again, by further masking textures and smaller objects, and separating their colors. If anyone wants the original layered PSD to do more magic, you can have it here:
http://www.hearthworks.net/1925/1925_office_xmas_party_12.12.2021.psd.zi...
You have exactly one year to post the next refinement!
You might notice in the high resolution version that the faces are oddly higher resolution than the surrounding parts of the image. This is a bit of AI deployed on the faces, called Remini. Google it to learn more, but in a nutshell, Remini analyzes a face that is low resolution or blurry and magically reconstructs it in high resolution by drawing from a huge library of face components. Remini reassembles face components onto a map based on the original image. The process is hit-or-miss as far as how it can interpret low-quality image data. It was fun to apply it to this image one face at a time and integrate the rendered AI faces back into the master image.
I feel that I know all these characters in the photo intimately, having spent a lot of time on each one of them. I’ve given them all first names to distinguish the Photoshop layer names. My wife asks me which lady I might’ve fancied back in the day, and I think it’s a tie between ‘Mary’ (the blonde in front of the ‘504’ door wearing purple) and ‘Bobbie’ (third-to-the-right of ‘Lulu’, (the pixie by the desk), with brown hair, a green coat and blue dress, looking directly into the camera). Those two have nice, approachable personalities. I’m intrigued by ‘Lila’ (the mysterious lady on the floor in front of the desk), but she’s perhaps too brooding for 1925 Me to take on; and ‘Lulu’ is far too racy and trendy for my sensibilities.
I was born in 1963, so I imagined a lot of these people from 1925 as being my many older relatives who were a huge part of my childhood in the 60’s and 70’s. My grandmother was born in 1890 and her gaggle of five sisters had birth years that ranged between 1885 and 1902. Though elderly, they were all alive and vibrant for most of my childhood, and greatly influenced me.
I’ve been patiently waiting for this time of year when Dave publishes this wonderful photo, to submit my contribution. I think this version turned out pretty nice.
@ Born Too Late - my geographical fate is the opposite of yours: I started out in the Alameda, California and moved to Massachusetts some 20 years ago. Massachusetts is really a great place to live—weather be damned!
@ DavidK - Yes, ‘Lila’ did indeed turn out to be beautified by the AI software, Remini. In retrospect I think I got carried away with rouging people’s cheeks, but without it, the skin tones just seemed too flat.
Cheers,
—Massafornian
HUAAgreed, davidk ... most likely she's a downright dollbaby but there is a definite glint in her eye and you must admit she has a secret or two or ten. Maybe she's even got something on some of the other girls.
Not nefariousI’ve had my eye on that woman on the far left in front of the ION window for years, JennyPennifer. She has a touch of high color, and I really like that ringlet that has broken loose by her right eye. She seems mild yet ready for fun. Not naughty.
At this rateI'm thinking that by the 2025 centenary we should be ready for an animatronic enlivening of this ongoing party.
Cast of charactersAbsolutely outstanding job of colorization, Massafornian!
It really brings out details that were easy to overlook.
I see the Serbian Anarchist, peering out just to the right of the Big Boss with the cigar, and wonder what he's planning. And the guy hiding just below the life of the party, with the STOP/GO headgear - he looks like he's hiding something, for sure.
But is the Big Boss truly the Man? My money is on the distinguished looking silver haired gent at the top right, overlooking the affair with a cautious gaze ...
And, who really *is* the mustachioed guy to his left, glaring at the photographer?
Is he worried about this photo getting out? Does he appear on a Wanted poster??
Merry Thank YouBecause it's never Christmas until the Office Party and new Office Party Comments.
Office Stories@ DavidK - If you have Photoshop, try downloading the PSD and you’ll see their names in the layers palette. The oilcan lady I named ‘Janelle’ because she looks like my cousin who has that name. I believe ‘Janelle’ to be the well-regarded office trickster.
The aging lush in the top-right standing group of men is named ‘Redd’. Me thinks he’s barely evading his mortality this fine evening, and perhaps is about to fall off of whatever he’s perched upon, to be carried out to a waiting cab, muttering something about his childhood pet dog, Wilberforce. After his early departure his hip flask was found on the floor, where he fell. No one knows what happened to it, or its contents.
The leader of the pack is named ‘Boss’, for obvious reasons. My wife thinks that perhaps he has a familial connection to ‘Bertha’, the large lady in the red dress. Boss’s blotch is an expanding skin growth. By 1945, it will have grown over his face, poor fellow. Unfortunately, the portly Boss died of a heart attack in 1946 while un-crating his new supply of Consuegra cigars and munching on a donut.
I note in this photo that there is no evidence of food or drink, save the candy canes. So while we have conjectured on this post about the state of inebriation these people might be in, strong drink seems unlikely at this event, particularly in the age of prohibition these people find themselves in. (Redd is the exception, having brought his own supply of spirits.) The food might be in another part of the room, but the lack of it has me thinking that this event was a relatively brief gathering after work.
‘Lulu’, the office pixie, is only 19 years old. She is Boss’s niece. This makes her somewhat problematic for all concerned in the office, and something of a political figure. She’s not exactly incompetent at her job, but the office matriarch, ‘Ursula’ (sitting on the floor in the green dress) was grudgingly forced to hire her. Lulu got married to a Studebaker salesman in 1928, moved to Pasadena in 1930, and had 4 children. She died in 1988 in a car accident.
The thing about the brooding ‘Lila’ that no one knew was that she had a very wealthy aunt in New York City. In 1934 her aunt passed away, and Lila inherited nearly $3 million dollars in property and bonds. She moved to the Upper East Side in 1936, but never married. She lived to the age of 103, dying in 1998.
Here's a closeup of Lila:
Go-GoIs that something hanging from the wall or sitting on the man's head as a prank? Has it ever been commented on before? Though not shown, there has to be a portable Victrola and stack of jazz records somewhere for when the party gets hot! This was the height of the Charleston era and there are plenty of flappers present!
A White Elephant In The RoomMay explain the oil can, the Honey Bear, and all the other strange gifts.
I don't know how long the White Elephant Gift party has been around, but my wife and I just had one at our house.
That is one thing that I have been looking at all these years on Shorpy (the crazy gifts), and now realize the crazy gifts could be from the White Elephant in the room.
Merry Christmas and a Happy new Year to all my Shorpyite brothers and sisters.
(Thanks archfan. Good to know that it is still around after all these years)
Colors!Kudos, Massafornian! At first I thought, hm, some of those dresses are awfully bright, but then I realized of course that for the office party some people always wear a “special” outfit. I doubt that woman in the red satin dress would have worn it any other day but it’s so Christmasy how could she resist!
Colors!Kudos, Massafornian! At first I thought, hm, some of those dresses are awfully bright, but then I realized of course that for the office party some people always wear a “special” outfit. I doubt that woman in the red satin dress would have worn it any other day but it’s so Christmasy how could she resist!
Re: Go-GoVictrolaJazz asks if the mini traffic signal on the head of the man at the back, to the right of the tree, has been commented on before. Yes! Many times over the years, in fact. This would provide a fine opportunity to review the long and enjoyable string of comments where you will find the following: Going to a Go-Go (12/12/2020), Still GOGO after all these years (12/20/2019), Festive Dress (12/19/2015), Must have been a heck of a party (12/23/2014), No one seems to have noticed (12/14/2012), Office A-Go-Go (12/25/2010), Slow on the uptake (12/24/2010), Kimono-wearing parrot? (12/23/2010), I can’t find Don Draper (12/23/2010), Naughty Naughty (04/21/2009), Getting Oiled at the Office Xmas Party (12/15/2008), Dramatis Personae (12/15/2008), and, finally, A Story in every face (12/15/2008) which includes a Dave link to a Shorpy post with a real GO-GO traffic signal in it.
Time travel?Either Johnny Depp was the original Doctor Who time travelling as a woman or his mother was working Working for Western Electric that Christmas
A white elephant party?I hadn't thought of that and now I'm disappointed. For years I have been daydreaming about the oil can lady, the one with the unnervingly lascivious direct look.
Then I remember she'd be old enough to be my grandmother. Jeepers.
Grateful Holiday pome These people, alas, are all now dust.
But we on Shorpy surely must
visit them once more.
Cheer to all on Shorpy!
Sad or Stimulating, or a bit of both?Having been recently retired, with no more company Christmas parties to attend, I am faced with a conundrum.
Is it sad that the 1925 Christmas Party on Shorpy is now the Office Party I look forward to the most, or is it tantalizing that the faces and actions of these folks, now long gone, give all of us smiles nearly a century later?
Let this serve as a reminder to treat every moment as if that moment is also "frozen in time"!
Merry Christmas, Dave, and the entire Shorpy family!
MomObviously, this is another photo in the Shorpy Hall of Fame inaugural class, but the best thing about it for me is that it was likely taken when my mom was just a newborn, having come into this world on December 17, 1925. Merry Christmas to all and a Happy Heavenly 97th Birthday to my mom!
My how time fliesSeems like it was just a month or two ago when last Christmas flew by with this pic.
NobodyHas changed much from last year. Remarkable.
Gag Gifts?I look forward to this party every year, and I notice something new each December. It's occurred to me that everyone in the photo is holding some kind of small gift, and all of them look like "white elephants": a toy horse, an oil can, a little bear, a toy policeman's hat—perhaps it was a "Secret Santa" kind of gag gift swap, and each gift was appropriately unique to the receiver. The photograph makes every one of these people forever young, and I always wonder what happened to each one of them: all those life stories that we'll never know. (I hope they all got a Christmas bonus!) Happiest of Holidays—and a Happy, Healthy New Year—to every Shorpyite.
The finer detailsI’ve chosen to focus on some of the smaller, obscure points this year in my investigation of this beloved photo. The woman in the bobby hat towards the left? Go south to the hand of the woman in front of her, the hand on the shoulder of the woman in the light-colored dress: that hand looks disembodied and is therefore creepy. Person who looks most Photoshopped in? The woman to the immediate left of that hand, staring right into your soul. Stuff like that. The picture is positively filthy with wacky, kooky, scary little things.
Sober thoughtFourteen years of beautiful fascination. Wonder if some folks who commented earlier, by now "are with the people on the photo" too?
Go-Go indeedI just wanted to second the man at the back, being bald myself. Go Go, folks.
Christmas TreesIf nothing else, we have made great advances in Christmas tree technology.
Every year they look a bit youngerMeanwhile, every year I look less like my father and more like my grandfather.
Love the ones you're withThanks for the labor of love and commerce Shorpy is. Years ago this photo evoked for me speculations about what may have divided these office mates. Now what comes out of this photo is the love that is possible if only ... with enough time and enough patience and enough "having lived through" being absent from one another we arrive at a finality of cherishing "in spite of" or even "because of" the uniqueness we bring.
The big read 1925I wonder how many of them were concealing new books in their purses, briefcases, or desk drawers. It was an era of readers, and 1925 was a banner year. Here are some of the newly-printed titles waiting for them in bookstores:
Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
Hemingway, In Our Time
Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway
Dreiser, An American Tragedy
Christie, The Secret of Chimneys
Dos Passos, Manhattan Transfer
Cather, The Professor’s House
Loos, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
Milne, a Winnie the Pooh story at Christmas
Kafka, The Trial (if you read German)
Proust, Albertine Disparue (if you read French—though some of them may still be working through the 1922 translation of Swann’s Way).
By December, early subscribers could have accumulated ten months of the new “New Yorker.”
But let’s hope that they still had a few years to be blissfully unaware of Mein Kampf, published in Germany in July.
There's one in every office. Frank is holding up an equipment assignment sheet while calling (vainly) for the frivolity to end and a return to work. He will not succeed.
Group AnalysisObviously far too long a comment, but Shorpy is so inspirational. Still had fun thinking and writing, as well as viewing picture again.
I was wondering about the woman at the far left. She is showing a sideways glance, and nobody else in the picture has a sideways glance. A sideways glance can be a powerful indication of attention to a subject, like romantic attention or professional attention or just surprise, but in any case something out of the ordinary. Like here, it seems different, just that one woman.
Trying to analyze a sideways glance, there is the face angle (determined by the nose angle) and the eyes angle. For a sideways glance like this, the eyes are directly pointed at the subject, but the face is pointed elsewhere. Using a reasonably limited choice of angles (0, 15, 30, 45) and expressing angles as "eyes angle / face angle" (eyes come first, most expressive), then this mystery woman with the sideways glance could be a 0/30.
Directly below her on the floor is a 45/0 woman, and her eyes angle is the extreme opposite. Seems absolute difference between the two angles can show degree of interest or attention, not the amount of either angle. With any 45/0 difference then attention seems to be very much elsewhere. The 30/45 woman to her right apparently has her attention directed to the same subject, but not to the same degree, more a casual interest, just a difference of 15 between her angles.
And the next woman above is a 30/30, also looking in that direction, but no difference between her angles, no indication of interest or attention, just looking.
Also just looking, but now at the camera, are all the 0/0 men and women, no differences, the largest group. They seem to be posing conventionally for the picture, and there is no apparent sign of interest or attention (other than to the camera). The exact pose varies by individual, some are smiling more than others, but they are all 0/0's. Some 0/0's may be simple conformists, and others may be nonconformists bored stiff (they can still smile, for the camera), but you can't probably tell which is which from the picture.
The big boss on the right is a 0/0, and the men in line with him are mostly 0/0's too, diligently following his traditional example. Above him are three 45/45's, you may not be able to tell about attention or interest from a 45/45, no difference there, in that way like a 0/0. However they are definitely not posing for the camera in any conventional way, not following the big boss example, and probably not in line to succeed him. His successor would probably be a 0/0 closest to him.
We could also consider tilt angle of the head as a variable, but that's more difficult to determine, because it varies with perspective, further away or closer to the camera. Also could consider extent of smiles, but that also difficult to determine. Eyes angle and face angle (nose angle) should be easier.
These angle measurements are probably useful only in a posed office photo, like this one. In a family photo 0/0's can be visibly full of emotion. And in real life anyone can look at you straight on, a 0/0, with amazement or fury or love or anything else. So angles won't help much in real life, although a sideways glance can still show interest and then create reciprocal interest, even mutual interest.
Mistletoe and High Voltage for all the women!I love how the ladies' hair has that "Bride of Frankenstein" look ... creepy yet sexy. It reminds me to get the yule log out.
ZoomThat was a quick year.
Another Year Gone ByBeen seeing this annually for a long time now, am I the first to comment ?? Anyways all these souls, their troubles and happy days are behind them and now are just dust in the wind … enjoy yourselves as we will be dust too! Merry Christmas
My Newest Favorite Christmas Tradition!I have gotten to the point of looking so forward to this party each year, it has indeed become one of my favorite Christmas traditions! LOL
For most of those attending the party, they are indeed, "living life!" That is so valuable, the ability to live life. On a personal note, I am learning that this year, having lost my precious wife in March, to Dementia. As iamjanicemarie well noted, all of these, are now just "dust in the wind."
Which makes me wonder, in what order did they pass? Did some in the picture in 1925 not survive till the party in 1926? Who was the last to go, and in what year? In the hundreds of comments, some pointing out actual things, others just speculating ... we can learn one lesson.
Live Life Fully Every Day. Who knows, a hundred years from now, you may still be having an effect on someone who you never even met!
Merry Christmas, Shorpy family!
What's up with the gals?Are they wearing kryptonite jewelry?
Old friendsI never get tired of this party and these coworkers. The job, yeah, I'm sick of it, but the people make it all worthwhile. I feel like I've known them forever.
Welcome Back, Dear 1925 Office Party Friends. . . and all Shorpy friends, too!
I look forward to seeing this wonderful photo every year. These folks never age, unlike the rest of us. I find this reassuring: life goes on, as it did for the office partiers whose lives continued through the Depression, WWII, and possibly even on to the 1990s. I always wonder who they were and what happened to them.
Here's to a Happy Holiday season and a peaceful 2024.
Seems Like Old TimesNice to see familiar faces, even though I never met them. However much they aged after this photograph, we'll never know, so just once each year, it's 1925 again.
StableThis firm has a very stable workforce. Every year, it's the same folks in the Christmas photo.
Macabre variationAlthough certainly macabre, I do like the door that iamjanicemarie tentatively opened and that HarahanTim swung fully open. In what order did these people pass? The annual response to this photo has definitely taken a curious turn, but I’m glad to chime in.
First to go, I believe, was Boss Man with the cigar, the very next morning, in the wee hours. He’s clearly in bad physical shape, a massive coronary waiting to happen. And it wasn’t the fault of one of those young ladies sitting on the floor that it happened in her bed. It was a different time when office and sexual politics were vile, and everyone was drunk.
Last to go was Heather on the far left in back, framed by the glass of the door. She’s only 23 in the photo, and she lived right into the next century, dying at 102 in 2004. She had moved back to Ohio, and on her last day was surrounded by her children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and even one of her great-great-grandchildren. They all loved her very much.
It's finally Christmas ...... when this bunch show up. I checked; they're all there. Proceed to celebrate. Merry Christmas, everyone xoxo
In the officeIt's hard to imagine this bunch "working from home". The dynamic would be lost with a "Zoom" holiday party.
Fire ExtinguisherJust behind the gentleman with the "GO" signal on his head it looks like there is a classic soda/acid fire extinguisher that I noticed for the first time today. Conveniently located next to what appears to be a rather combustible tree. Season's Greetings to Dave, tterrace and the whole Shorpy gang.
Well, having had time to ponderabout these folk for a good decade since discovering Shorpy, I have come to a tentative yet preliminary assessment.
The only woman with no apparent makeup and yet the most beautiful features is the lady sitting on the floor at bottom left. Really in a class of her own in this crowd with those almond eyes and high cheekbones, yet with hair and dressed a bit out of date, but still sporting brand new shoes judging by their soles. How they got her to sit on the dirty floor for the pic is beyond me.
In any case, the photographer has just given her a huge suggestive wink, and she's snapped her head to the right in response, looking faintly amused / bemused, no doubt used to the unwanted male gaze. The woman second to her left is staring at her, annoyed that Gloria (for that is her name) has caught the roving eye of the photographer instead of her -- the body language is obvious. The flapper two to the left of Ms Envious is giving the photographer a bit of a come-on with her lopsided grin -- she has sussed out his game.
Mr Fatlips the boss is terminally near-sighted but for photos and thus posterity takes his glasses off when posing, as one can see. What he looks like with them on is a subject for a horror movie.
The rest of the crowd barring a few are to a greater or lesser degree tipsy on smuggled-in booze, it being Temperance Time, er, prohibited drinkees time in America
I'll have an update in future when other things become more clear to me from my favorite Shorpy image.
Merry Xmas to all!
Finger WavesThe blond and brunette whose backs are against the door and doorjamb, respectively, look modern. The other modern looking girl is two rows in front of them, also a brunette. These three look timeless. The other women either still have long hair wrapped up some way or they have those awful finger waves that look like ridges in their hair. None of the girls that have finger waves have benefitted from that style. It does not flatter any face shape, it just looks weird and kind of Bride of Frankensteinish.
The blond miss sitting on the floor is looking daggers at the moody looking woman sitting against the desk. I will always wonder why.
Holiday Party Fun (2023)Dear Shorpy folks and friends of the site.
This year I used this very photo to make a SPOT THE DIFFERENCE game at our work Christmas party.
Each of the participants had 20 minutes to spot all 19 differences. I used Photoshop and AI to make the changes to the photo and we all had so much fun with it.
If you would like me to post that image here, you may have fun too! Let me know Dave!
Also, we have some new friends that might be joining us on this site as they were fascinated by all the expressions of this 1925 party. I did inform them of the site and URL.
Merry Christmas everyone
What is on the hand of the number 2 guy next to the boss?There is something on his pointer finger and thumb. Could these be some type of grippers for leaving through papers? Could it be he was working until they forced him to come get his picture taken? He is clearly annoyed to be there. Maybe he is plotting to have the boss removed so he can be in charge?
Half a MillionI expect that the number of reads for Office Xmas Party will pass 500,000 shortly. Is this a record number of reads for a Shorpy photo?
[Office Xmas Party holds the No. 2 spot. Shorpy's most popular post is ... Lady in the Water, with over 640,000 reads. And at No. 3 is The Beaver Letter. - Dave]
Merry Christmas to all Shorpians!May your holidays be merry and bright. A special Merry Christmas to Dave and tterrace who keep this very special website going. And to all pictured from that office party held nearly 100 years ago, a Merry Heavenly Christmas to all!
ONE MORE TIMEAfter passing this photo around for everyone to look and laugh at, it was probably hung on the wall for a time, then taken to someone's home and put away in a chest and forgotten ... perhaps copies were made.
But how would these people feel if they knew that almost a half million people have studied it?
Also those desks have been in their current positions for a very long time, the floor below them new and pristine.
[This was not a casual snapshot -- the National Photo Company was primarily a news service. Its photographs appeared in newspapers, advertisements and publicity material. This particular image might have been used for Western Electric's in-house newsletter or a company Christmas card. - Dave]
Thank ya Dave for clearing that up.
Meet some of the boys ...Introducing ...
Charles S. Barker, District Superintendent: "With the right personnel and a good organization, you can do anything in telephony"
E.N. Searles, Division Superintendent
J.E. Grant, R.D. Dick, and...
Walter W. Lodding, Division Accountant
... with an invitation to Christmas at the Loddings':
This image was featured in the December 1926 issue of the Western Electric News with the title: "YOUTH AND THE CHRISTMAS SPIRIT" and caption: "Santa Claus did right by this little lad the son of W.W. Lodding of the Installation Division 11 Headquarters"
Looking daggers?Susanhumeston wondered, "The blond miss sitting on the floor is looking daggers at the moody looking woman sitting against the desk. I will always wonder why."
I have always been intrigued by that interaction. Pretty much come to the conclusion that three of the ladies were diverted by something off set to the left. One (Charlotte) clearly annoyed, one (Lila) merely taking it in, and one (Gwen) mildly amused.
NamesMarkJo - nice job finding the real names!
I'm fascinated by the different names and nicknames in all the posts. Then I scroll to 12/23/21; alex_shorpy did a great job labeling everyone. Or go further back to 12/22/19 and see davidk's comment.
I also don't look at these folks as having turned into dust. Every year they come alive in the imaginations of many readers.
Maligayang Pasko to all.
Well, what else?Say, we don't view the full size for a micro-study. What we see is the "pyramid" of working stiffs that retracted into one side of the office against the forceful advance of upper management group. Sharp diagonal dividing line was disturbed somewhat at the bottom, by the lady and gent behind her.
There he is!Every year I look forward to seeing dear old Mr. Hilter at the top of the picture looking so skeptical!
"Mildred, what did you do with my flask"?This party was during the TEETH of prohibition too! The REAL fun will come later.
(The Gallery, Bizarre, Christmas, Natl Photo, The Office)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/32246u.thumbnail.jpg "Office Xmas Party: 1925")
- Krazy Kat Klub: 1921
- ... of six National Photo glass negatives from 1921 labeled "Krazy Kat," showing a group of college-age kids painting and smoking in the ... restaurant. Which has a treehouse. View full size.
Krazy Kat Klub When I saw this photo, these song lyrics came into my head: ... Posted by Dave - 08/05/2012 - 4:42pm -
![Washington. D.C. One of six National Photo glass negatives from 1921 labeled "Krazy Kat," showing a group of college-age kids painting and smoking in the yard of what seems to be a club or restaurant. Which has a treehouse. View full size.
Krazy Kat KlubWhen I saw this photo, these song lyrics came into my head:
Five foot two, eyes of blue
But oh! what those five foot could do
Has anybody seen my girl?
Turned up nose, turned down hose
Flapper, yes sir, one of those
Has anybody seen my girl?
@DeweyMe too!!
Mod kidsI would love to see the other five photos from this series. These kids are incredibly modern-looking, especially the gal on the right. She appears to be wearing a miniskirt...in 1921!
[The flapper girls and their bohemian boyfriends will be back! - Dave]
A High-Level EstablishmentIs this what you'd call a speakeasy? It'd be hard for them coppers to get up there.
Then again, considering the location, tea would be a wiser choice of beverage.
Kool KatsThey look like they would be such fun people to hang out with. I wish I had something like this in my backyard!
SophisticatedThe thing that gets me about these Kit Kat Klub photos is that the young women in particular seem to be trying so hard to look so sophisticated, and I suppose like rebels. The short skirts, the rolled down stockings, and bobbed hair are all things that would have scandalized their parents. And of course the ladies smoke, but they're sophisticated so they have holders for their cigarettes. Fifty years later their equivalents would be going braless, wearing their hair straight, having casual sex, and smoking pot. And probably those of this group who were still alive would be tut-tutting about how they never did anything like this when they were this age.
Krazy KittenThe young lady in the middle is just absolutely smoking hot, I might add.
Some Like it HotThe one above the hottie looks just like Jack Lemmon in the above mentioned movie.
One more from the Krazy Kat, pleaseWe've seen five of the six photos from the Krazy Kat. Do I have to beg for the sixth? Okay, I'm begging.
[Here it is. Pretty much the same as the fifth. Click to enlarge! - Dave]
How to enlarge? take 2Would like to enlarge this "Pretty much the same as the fifth"...
[See where it says "Click to enlarge"? Try doing that. - Dave]
Thanks Dave .. I guess I should have said "enlarge to original size" This one comes out very grainy . I have purchased three of the 5 Kats photos and am considering the last two. and would like to see this one on original size. These "kats" are great.
[It's 1100 pixels wide, same size as the others. It looks grainy because the emulsion is deteriorating. - Dave]
(The Gallery, D.C., Eateries & Bars, Krazy Kat Club, Natl Photo)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/04659u_0.thumbnail.jpg "Krazy Kat Klub: 1921")
- Bathing Costume Contest: 1921
- ... Washington, D.C. "Bathing Costume Contest." Note Felix/Krazy Kat doll. National Photo Company Collection. View full size.
... is holding?
Re: Felix the Cat? Looks a little like Krazy Kat to me. Class?
Krazy Kat Looks like Krazy Kat to me
... Posted by Dave - 07/06/2018 - 10:20pm -
- Syne of Ye Krazy Kat: 1921
- From July 1921, the Krazy Kat club off Thomas Circle in Washington, with Cleon Throckmorton to the ... logo and some of their hep-ness from George Herriman's Krazy Kat cartoon, which was at the peak of its popularity at the time of the ... Massachusetts Avenue. The building on the left where the Krazy Kat is located is now a gym. I'm not sure if it's the same building ... Posted by Dave - 08/05/2012 - 4:48pm -
- Throck and the Kats: 1921
- ... Cleon Throckmorton at the easel on the terrace of the Krazy Kat, an establishment described by the Washington Post two years ... View full size. National Photo Company Collection.
Krazy Kat Raided!
Washington Post / Saturday, February 22, 1919
... Posted by Dave - 08/05/2012 - 4:49pm -
![July 15, 1921. Cleon Throckmorton at the easel on the terrace of the Krazy Kat, an establishment described by the Washington Post two years earlier as "something like a Greenwich Village coffeehouse." Scroll down to the comments for more on "Throck," an engineering graduate who made his name designing sets for Eugene O'Neill's plays, and was the first art director for CBS in the early days of television. View full size. National Photo Company Collection.
Krazy Kat Raided!
Washington Post / Saturday, February 22, 1919
ROW IN KRAZY KAT LANDS 14 IN JAIL
Carefree Bohemians Start Rough-House and Cop Raids Rendezvous.
Fourteen would-be Bohemians yesterday appeared in police court and demanded a jury trial on various charges preferred against them by Policeman Roberts, who, with the assistance of two night watchmen, raided the Krazy Kat, which is something like a Greenwich Village coffee house, in an alley near Thomas Circle.
Roberts, under orders to watch the rendezvous of the Bohemians, heard a shot fired in the Krazy Kat shortly after 1 o'clock yesterday morning. The watchmen were quickly pressed into service and a raiding party was organized.
When Roberts climbed the narrow stairway leading from a garage to the scene of trouble, he found himself in the dining room of the Krazy Kat, confronted with gaudy pictures evolved by futurists and impressionists and what appeared to the policeman to be a free-for-all fight.
At the Second Precinct police station 25 prisoners, including three women — self-styled artists, poets and actors, and some who worked for the government by day and masqueraded as Bohemians by night — were examined.
Those against whom charges were placed gave the following names:
John Don Allen, Cleon Throckmorton and John Stiffen, charged with keeping a disorderly house; Charles Flynn, drinking in public; J. Albion Blake, disorderly conduct; Walter Thomas, assault and disorderly conduct; Harry Rockelly, drinking in public; George Miltry, disorderly conduct; Mitchell McMahon, drinking in public; Joseph Ryon, disorderly; Anthony Hanley, drinking in public; Frank Moran, disorderly conduct, Leo Cohen, drinking in public and disorderly conduct, and Raymond Coombs, disorderly conduct.
----------------------------
February 17, 1957
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — A $50 bet, an engineering diploma and a hobby turned Cleon Throckmorton from the world of structural design to a lucrative career in art.
A native of nearby Absecon, Throckmorton, now in semi-retirement, has designed settings for over 300 plays all because a friend bet him $50 he couldn't earn a living from art.
"A few of my artist friends and myself were kidding around years ago in a restaurant in Pittsburgh and I said anyone with an common sense could paint," he explained.
Art was his hobby and the bet was collected after two of his works were accepted by the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C., for its semi-annual exhibit. "That made me really serious about art," he says.
Although he had just earned an engineering degree from Carnegie Tech, "Throck" started on a career in theatrical setting design and is still going strong here as a designer and painter of party backdrops for a beachfront hotel. Unlike the conventional artist, "Throck" uses gallon jugs of paint and does his work on the floor with a brush attached to a long bamboo pole.
Throckmorton, now 59, spends about six months each year at his Atlantic City work with the raimainder of his time scattered at spot jobs in Hollywood and New York.
-------------------------
October 25, 1965
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) Cleon Throckmorton, 68, who gained prominence as a set designer for playwright Eugene O'Neill, died Saturday in hospital after a brief illness. Throckmorton joined O'Neill at the Provincetown Playhouse in Massachusetts and prepared the sets for O'Neill's Emperor Jones, The Hairy Ape, and Beyond the Fringe, which were later produced at the Theatre Guild in New York. During the pioneering days of television, Throckmorton became the Columbia Broadcasting System's first art director. He is survived by his wife.
Krazy ManThis is becoming quite the detective story! I cannot wait for the continuing adventures of Throckmorton & his crew. Given that the bust happened two years before these pictures, it seems that Cleon kept his establishment running for a while.
Thomas Circle looks, unfortunately, fairly well re-developed as of the last time Google snapped a picture.
I will be in DC in May (I grew up not far from Glen Echo Park, actually). I may take a little visit down to Thomas Circle to see if there are echoes of the Krazy Kat in some alley there...
[Throck was enrolled at GWU. Still to come: Photos of the alley. Which, coincidentally, is just a couple blocks from my day job of the past 13 years. - Dave]
Mrs. ThrockmortonJust a quick search of the 'Cleon Throckmorton' name dug up something kind of fun -- an archived letter to Time magazine from 1947.
Pages two and three have Mrs. Throckmorton's sister disputing TIME's claim that it was Mrs. Throckmorton photographed puffing a cigar at opera. If I'm chasing the right trail, Throckmorton married Juliet St. John Brenon. Her father was a (highly respected it would seem) NYC music critic, Algernon St. John Brenon. It would be cool to know if one of those girls was Juliet, wouldn't it?
ThrockI wonder if there is any chance the young lady he is painting became Mrs. Throckmorton.
ThrockGoogle this guy. He was a major player in the theatre world. Very interesting.
Gaudy pictures evolved by futuristsWhat a great line, in a fascinating story. These women look dangerous to me; not just flappers, but vamps!
Alley KatsIs the alley in question Green Court, off 14th near Thomas Circle? I worked in one of the buildings on 14th and could look out on the alley which then, the '90s, housed the Green Lantern, a gay club. I think it became the Tool Shed.
Ahh, yes, looks like my hunch was correct...
From "Gay Life Remembered" by Bob Roehr in Independent Gay Forum...
Krazy Kat in 1920 was a "Bohemian joint in an old stable up near Thomas Circle ... (where) artists, musicians, atheists, professors" gathered. Miraculously the structure still stands, five blocks from the White House, as a gay bar called the Green Lantern.
I really do empathize...with "Throck." My wife is always charging me with "keeping a disorderly house." I keep trying to tell her she just doesn't understand my absurdist aesthetic. It's not easy being a visionary, I guess.
No Connection!(Washington Post / Saturday, February 22, 1919
ROW IN KRAZY KAT LANDS 14 IN JAIL
Carefree Bohemians Start Rough-House and Cop Raids Rendezvous.)
...........................................
There is no connection ..... but the date of this Post article was the same day my father (bless his soul) was born.
This is good stuff Dave. Thank You.
My new hero(ine)... is the woman who is having her portrait done. Not only is she beautiful, but as evidenced in the other photos, she seemed to have a bit of a rebellious streak for daring to show so much skin (someone earlier referenced that she seemed to be wearing - *gasp!* - a miniskirt, in 1921.) That rules, in my book! Plus, she has such a coy look about her. It's fun to think that maybe she's a gypsy who has found the fountain of youth, and she's still roaming around and haunting places like Soho artists' lofts and tiny Parisian cafes, looking exactly the same now as she did then, smoking cigarettes and taking everything in through those dark eyes....
A sword? Looks like the lady on the table might have some future swashbuckling planned.
Heart Stopping , Sucking In Air GreatThis photo is so good on so many levels it hard to take it all in. Whew
About that Cigar & Mrs ThrockmortonThe 1920 Washington Census shows Cleon's father, Ernest U. Throckmorton, as proprietor of a cigar shop. Could be it's true she was smoking a stogie? Other info on this sheet has the parents at 55 yrs old. Mother's name is Roberta, born in Indiana. Cleon was 22. Home address is 1536 Kingman Place (something) NW.
[According to his N.Y. Times obituary in 1965, Mom & Dad's full names were Ernest Upton and Roberta Cowing Throckmorton; Cleon was born October 18, 1897; his wife was the former Juliet St. John Brenon. - Dave]
Green LanternBy coincidence, after reading about the Green Lantern here yesterday, I was watching a 1918 Charlie Chaplin comedy called "A Dog's Life", and noticed that the saloon in that film is called "Green Lantern".
It made me wonder if that phrase has some particular "folk meaning" or significance, or relevance to saloons or drinking, but I can't find anything on google but the comic book hero by that name.
Throckmorton Place $895K in '04!Shucks...you missed your chance to buy the Throckmorton home. From some 2004 Washington Blade (another gay connection!) classifieds...
LOGAN CIRCLE New listing! Fabulous renovated TH. 1.5
blks from Logan Circle, Whole Foods & more! 3 story TH w/
separate bsmt apt and 2 story owner’s unit w/ beautiful gar-
dens and deck. Live in 2 BR, 2.5 BA unit w/ hdwd flrs, lots of light,& lrg bathrooms. Rental 1 BR w/ private entrance. Great condo alternative. Must see! $895,000 OPEN SAT 5/15 &
SUN 5/16 (1 - 4 pm) 1536 Kingman Place. (202) 332-3228
Jeff Shewey, COLDWELL BANKER / PARDOE.
CleonWhile looking online for his paintings I found this:
Throckmorton, Cleon (1897–1965), designer. Born in Atlantic City, he studied at Carnegie Tech and at George Washington University before embarking on a career as a landscape and figure painter. After a few years he turned to the theatre, assisted on the designs for The Emperor Jones (1920), and later created the sets for All God's Chillun Got Wings (1924), S.S. Glencairn (1924), In Abraham's Bosom (1926), Burlesque (1927), Porgy (1927), Another Language (1932), Alien Corn (1933), and others. By his retirement in the early 1950s he had designed sets for over 150 plays. Throckmorton also drew up architectural plans for such summer theatres as the Cape Playhouse in Dennis, Massachusetts, and the Westport (Connecticut) Country Playhouse.
Cleon & JulietCleon's wife, Juliet St. John Brenon, according to her IMDB bio, was born in 1885, making her 37-ish during the time these photos were taken. Her uncle Herbert Brenon was a well-known silent film director who worked frequently with Cleon.
Apparently they had some connections to Society:
Baron Franz von Papen, three postcard autograph messages signed in the mid-1930s to American friend Mrs. Juliet Throckmorton in New York.
[Her November 1979 obituary in the New York Times gives her age at death as 82, which would mean she was born around 1897. Of course actresses (and actors) have been known to fudge their age. - Dave]
Throck of AgesFor what it's worth...the SSDI lists her as follows:
JULIET THROCKMORTON 01 Sep 1895 Nov 1979
It would appear that IMDB is quite mistaken, Hollywood fudging notwithstanding.
Juliet's ObitNovember 22, 1979 (NYT)
JULIET B. THROCKMORTON
Juliet Brenon Throckmorton, a stage and screen actress in the 1920s, and widow of Cleon Throckmorton, a noted stage designer who worked closely with Eugene O'Neill, died Sunday at Cabrini Medical Center. She was 82 years old and lived in Manhattan. Mrs. Throckmorton had in recent years been a contributor to Yankeee magazine, writing, among other subjects, about Eugene O'Neill, E.E. Cummings and other well-known people who had frequented her husband's Greenwich Village studio.
Juliet BrenonAre we sure Juliet is the one pictured? Juliet & Throck were not engaged until 1927 in NYC. Here's the announcement:](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/04656u.thumbnail.jpg "Throck and the Kats: 1921")
- Avant-Garden: 1921
- ... 15, 1921. Our third photo of the treetop table at the Krazy Kat club in Washington. View full size. National Photo Company Collection glass negative. (Coming Monday: Details on the Krazy Kat and one of the notables who ran it.)
Celebrity GG Is that ... Posted by Dave - 08/05/2012 - 4:52pm -
![July 15, 1921. Our third photo of the treetop table at the Krazy Kat club in Washington. View full size. National Photo Company Collection glass negative. (Coming Monday: Details on the Krazy Kat and one of the notables who ran it.)
Celebrity GGIs that Christian Slater's great-grandfather?
That GirlI'm totally hooked on the girl with her feet on the table. WOW!
Treetop TableOne of the tree drinkers carved his or her name into the side of the table. I can't quite make it out, but it looks something like "Nicole Hollis."
What is in a name anyway.Hmm. I see Mickie Mullin ...
[Between Dewey's comment and this one I blew the table up, below. - Dave]
Waiter, there's a leaf in my tea!Why do these photos always remind me of some song?
Rockabye table, in the treetop
When the wind blows, the table will rock
When the bough breaks, the table will fall
And down will come flappers, table and all
P.S. I love it that you put this one in the "Restaurants and Bars" category. LOL!
That GirlMe, too!
That's Awesome!!!People sure knew how to have a good time back then. Although, I guess you had to keep your imbibing to a minimum if you wanted to make it to the ground in one piece...
Totally IncredibleWhat an image. Fantastic! Can you imagine someone trying to open a club with a treehouse today?.. Lets see ... hmmmm the insurance bill would be $2 million a year, Greenpeace would picket you, County Legal would arrest you for smoking in a public place, Fire dept would shut you down ( open candle), yada yada ... Would someone please turn on the "Wayback" machine!
Take me to the Krazy KatOf all the photos I've seen on Shorpy, these images from the Krazy Kat are my favorites. Beautiful people doing scandalous things in a magical place... I want to go there right now!
Yowsa!Totally infatuated with the girl on the left.
(The Gallery, D.C., Eateries & Bars, Krazy Kat Club, Natl Photo)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/22060u.thumbnail.jpg "Avant-Garden: 1921")
- Branch Office: 1921
- July 15, 1921. More strange goings-on at the Krazy Kat. Our waiter has a ball and chain dangling from his sleeve. National ... Now that is one awfully hep shirt for 1924!
Krazy Kat Club Interesting landscaping choice. I think this summer I'm ... Posted by Dave - 08/05/2012 - 4:53pm -
- Krazy Kat Klub (Colorized): 1921
- Colorized version of Krazy Kat Klub . View full size.
People look good! Colorization is ... Posted by DorofromKs - 07/27/2010 - 11:00am -
- Brain Test: 1925
- ... if they were called nerds and I bet they never went to the Krazy Kat Club.
College? Isn't it interesting how these college kids ... read the article for $3.95. - Dave]
More Krazy Kat pleeze Yep, me can hardly solve the math question at the bottom. ... Posted by Dave - 08/31/2012 - 8:17pm -
![August 17, 1925. "Students of George Washington University in brain test." National Photo Company Collection glass negative. View full size.
PensThe pens in the pockets of the two guys up front makes me wonder if they were called nerds and I bet they never went to the Krazy Kat Club.
College?Isn't it interesting how these college kids look so much older than ones today or even a couple of decades ago. I wonder what their actual ages are!
Brain TestJust what are they testing for, intelligence or defects?
And here we have the origin of 'Brainiac'A nerdier looking group is difficult to imagine.
Brain Test SubjectsNone of them look like they fell off the turnip truck. Just imagine, they were probably the scientists who helped save this nation while working at facilities such as Los Alamos during WWII.
Nerds!was that term part of the lingo in 1925?
Sleep study team?GWU did a nationally-publicized study released in 1925 on how much sleep the brain really needs, and I'd bet that this photo is of the professor (front and center) and grad students who made up that team. The best free clue comes from the nyt.com preview of a December 13, 1925 New York Times article on the study, which includes these lines: "A Group at George Washington University. Left to right, Front Row -- Lester Petric, Thelma Hunt, Professor Moss, Katherine Omwake and Robert Ward. ... "
[It is indeed them. You can read the article for $3.95. - Dave]
More Krazy Kat pleezeYep, me can hardly solve the math question at the bottom. So give us more Kaa-Razy Kat Club stuff.
[There is no more. The Krazy Kupboard is bare. - Dave]
Geeks, GiftedYou say nerds, I say they look smart and interesting.
The teamAccording to the article, "Professor Moss" (front center) devised the sleep deprivation experiments but was then one of the subjects in the test himself.
Their finding: Sleep is the result of "intoxication ... caused evidently by an excess of toxins or poisons produced by muscular and nerve exertion," much like a "drunkard" falling asleep and waking up sober.
The ones I'm curious about are the woman second from right in the front row, identified as Katherine Omwake and the woman second from right in the back row, identified as Louise Omwake. Sisters?
(But I feel like a nap after reading about Louise Omwake's activities. She was goalkeeper for the GWU hockey team, captain of the basketball and tennis teams, also active in swimming and track, and evidently a good shot with a rifle. See, among many others, Washington Post 5/15/1927, p. 24. and 5/25/1928, p. M2. One minor puzzle: Post photos of Louise appear to show the woman identified here as Katherine.)
(The Gallery, D.C., Education, Schools, Natl Photo)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/14369u.thumbnail.jpg "Brain Test: 1925")
- Pie Eaters: 1921
- ... they might be more sympathetic and less hazppy.
Krazy Kat This was apparently taken the same time as this one https://www.shorpy.com/node/666 because Iola is holding Krazy Kat. I think the girl on her left is the one sitting to her right in that ... Posted by Dave - 07/06/2018 - 10:19pm -
![July 31, 1921. Washington, D.C. "Pie eating contest at Tidal Basin bathing beach." In the back row: the blurry but unmistakable facial contours of Iola Swinnerton. National Photo Company Collection glass negative. View full size.
Who won?No prizes for guessing!
Hazppy to be a Modern ManThe girl in the front / left has hairy legs. Once again, Shorpy has made me appreciate living in twenty first century North America. I wonder what people of the future will be disgusted by when they look at our photos?
[I wonder what people of the future will think will they look at these comments. - Dave]
Sheer enjoyment and delightQuite apart from the fact that there are several beautiful girls in this picture, it is a joy for several other reasons.
One cannot help but wonder whether the contestants ever considered whether their children and their children's children would be able to enjoy themselves in such simple and unaffected manner. In many ways, how lucky they were to live at a time when life was very much more simple, the war was behind them, everything appeared rosy, and the future was their own. There are times I would happily trade this supposedly civilised and advanced age for theirs.
As for the identity of the victor; I imagine the young boy felt very much a winner here! How lucky; a clutch of beautiful girls, and as much pie as he could eat.
Who Won??Do educated guesses count? I'm thinking the winner was the woman with pie smeared all over her face. The other ladies are eating their pie rather daintily.
I'm rather infatuatedwith the three women in the center: the splendid coif of the lady on the left, the laugh of the woman in the middle, and the delicate fingers balancing pie on the woman on the right. Also, how could anyone find the thin fuzz, barely visible, on that woman's legs disgusting? If certain modern men knew the time us modern women felt obligated to spend on our grooming, they might be more sympathetic and less hazppy.
Krazy KatThis was apparently taken the same time as this one https://www.shorpy.com/node/666 because Iola is holding Krazy Kat. I think the girl on her left is the one sitting to her right in that picture, too.
[This picture is dated July 31; the other is dated June 25. - Dave]
Aside from that, this is one amazing photo of a wonderful day and a time when people knew how to take joy in simple things. The expression on the middle girl eating pie is priceless! I would bet that crust was made with lard, which is the best kind.
P.S. I didn't notice the date, except for the year. Now, I wonder why she was carrying a stuffed toy to the beach, twice (or more, probably). Interesting! At any rate, they sure had a lot of fun at the Potomac bathing beach!
Simple happinessReading the comments by reader who mourn the loss of simpler pleasures with simpler times makes me wonder how long those times actually lasted. How long have pie-eating contests taken place? Pies have existed for centuries. There are notes of pie-eating contests occurring at county fairs in the 19th Century. Were they an imported idea from fairs in the Old Country?
Our pleasures have changed as technology has changed, The advent of electricity in homes certainly has changed the sorts of activities that we engage in for pleasure. I, for one, would make the trade of perusing Shorpy at my desk in an air-conditioned room in my home on a 100-degree late Spring day to participating in a pie-eating contests on a similar June day 90 years ago. Not that the pies don't look delicious.
Hard to tellwhere the smudges end and the pie filling begins
Not pizzahttp://www.snopes.com/photos/people/pizzawomen.asp
(The Gallery, D.C., Iola S., Natl Photo, Swimming)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/22100u.thumbnail.jpg "Pie Eaters: 1921")
- Loving Cup Lovelies: 1921
- ... Changed Bathing to Swimming" introduced around 1920.
Krazy Kat Looks like a doll version of a beloved comics character in the ... Posted by Dave - 07/06/2018 - 10:16pm -
- The Lonely Alley: 1923
- ... down there, I'll look for any remaining landmarks.
Krazy Kat Club at the left! This is the same alley as this picture of the Krazy Kat Club . Here's another from a similar angle.
(The Gallery, D.C., ... Posted by Dave - 04/20/2013 - 8:39pm -
![Another 1923 view of back-alley Washington, D.C., from an unlabeled Harris & Ewing plate. Who goes there, aside from the birds? View full size.
Who goes there?Milk Man
Coal Man
Ice Man
Boogey Man
[And horses. Note slitlike apertures to the right. -Dave]
Must beThe alley next to Saint Matthew's Cathedral, looking north toward N Street.
Fancy LampIt is only an alley, but note the fancy streetlight. Could that be a gaslight?
[Yes. -Dave]
Could also be- the alley behind St. Margaret's Church on the west side of the 1800 block on Connecticut Ave., NW. The next time I'm down there, I'll look for any remaining landmarks.
Krazy Kat Club at the left!This is the same alley as this picture of the Krazy Kat Club. Here's another from a similar angle.
(The Gallery, D.C., Harris + Ewing)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/SHORPY_42923a.thumbnail.jpg "The Lonely Alley: 1923")
- Possibly Naked: 1922
- ... Looks like the kind of gal that would hang out at the Krazy Kat or the Better 'Ole.
Gasp! Now that you have our attention..... ... Posted by Dave - 08/03/2012 - 8:06pm -
![July 28, 1922. Washington, D.C. "Unclothed woman behind '?' sign." That pretty well sums it up. National Photo Co. Collection glass negative. View full size.
Watch out for those nails!....and the barbed wire, too.
Nailed ItThis picture certainly captured my attention.
Someone should be very ashamed of themselves for this shoddy and heinous display.
That is some very poor nailing.
Unclothed WomanWith very strange tan line.
[Think beach socks. - Dave]
A RiddleEarly versions of Batman villains seem rather crude to the modern eye ...
Nails + Nudity = InjuryThose nails sticking out of that fence don't look like they'd be too kind to delicate skin. The thought makes me cringe.
I think...I know the answer.
?...I'm still trying to figure it out.
Winner!This is, without any real debate needed, the most random image ever seen on this site. I love it. I also love how she is "unclothed" not "naked."
Clara Bow's cousin, maybeLooks like the kind of gal that would hang out at the Krazy Kat or the Better 'Ole.
Gasp!Now that you have our attention.....
OK, I'm stumped...... can you reveal the answer please?
[There is no answer. - Dave]
The AnswerFrank Gorshin!
Ye are much too easyAmidst the hype, I bet a can of snuff she is wearing a bathing suit behind the question mark.
!Somewhere there's an unclothed man behind an exclamation point. When he meets this gal, no words will be necessary.
[Maybe he'd make a dash after her. - Dave]
.I wonder if she was missing hers.
Modern times.I can't believe she doesn't have her rolled down socks on. She's exposing her -- gasp -- ankles!
She has to be clothed behind the "?" sign. They didn't have nekkid people back in 1922. It wasn't allowed!!
Naked Nude UnclothedTraditionally, "naked" meant being undressed by onesself, unless someone else walked in on you ("She was surprised, naked, in the bath.") "Nude" was to be without clothes knowingly with others, as in "She modeled for artists in the nude." This woman is "unclothed", as she is in public without clothing, but nothing inappropriate is exposed.
At least that's how a professor of 19th century art explained it to me.
What I want to know is: why does both the fence behind her and the walkway she's standing on slope down to the right side of the image?
[It's a topological phenomenon that, as a geology professor once explained it to me, is called a "hill." - Dave]
Ak vs. EkkThe late great Lewis Grizzard told us that "naked" is merely being in an unclothed state, while "nekkid" means you're unclothed and up to something.
Scanties?I'd like to think that sweet-looking lass had SOME clothes on behind the punctuation, but what garments existed in 1922 that would have been completely concealed by the sign? Certainly not a bathing suit of the period.
[Below, also from 1922. Maybe she's wearing something similar with her arms out of the straps. More 1922 beach fashions here. - Dave]
The question is..."Have you seen my colon?"
1922 Advertisement... for Guess brand jeans!
Secrets well guardedThey certainly didn't want anyone crawling over the fence in search of answers, did they?
Sk8r GirlWhatever she's not got on, she is wearing a plaster over the scuff wound on her right knee, a very modern-looking touch. But she probably didn't earn this skater badge by grinding along the seawall ledge. It somehow recalls to me a 1920s John Held cartoon caption on a drawing of two flappers, one holding a powder puff and a compact:
"Is my nose shiny?"
"No, but your left knee is dusty."
Meanwhile, the nailsNails in that location don't seem to serve any structural purpose. My guess is that something's intended to be attached to them periodically, like seasonal banners or bunting maybe. Or perhaps it's an el cheapo provision for the nude, naked and unclothed people to hang their clothes on.
(The Gallery, Curiosities, D.C., Natl Photo)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/06771u.thumbnail.jpg "Possibly Naked: 1922")
- Elks Parade: 1916
- ... convention cartoons I'm reminded of George "Krazy Kat" Herriman's 1907 cartoons about a convention. The comics blog ... Posted by Dave - 07/23/2012 - 6:45pm -
!["Elks parade in Baltimore, 1916." The message on those paddle fans: "Bromo-Seltzer." Harris & Ewing Collection glass negative. View full size.
The Educator ShoeEven the sign was educational.
Big deal in BaltimoreObviously, this was very popular event. A quick visit to the Elks website indicates that the fraternal organization is still going strong. Are there any Baltimore-based Shorpsters who know if this parade is still happening there?
Sons of the Desert"We are the Sons of the Desert
Having the time of our lives!
Three thousand strong,
Marching along,
Far from our sweethearts and wives
(God bless them)..."
Ceremonial song of the lodge that Stan and Ollie belonged to, whose "exhausted ruler" exhorted the members of Tent 13 to show 100% attendance at the Chicago Convention.
Hat KnowledgeThose were the days when every man knew his hat size, and if he was a "long oval" or not.
And what a glorious riot of overhanging signs!
Plop plop, fizz fizzThe Bromo-Seltzer Tower is a noted landmark of downtown Baltimore.
On an unrelated note: My goodness, what a lot of bunting there is!
I'm amazed...At the number of people in the crowd, and the number of men marching. Today, the only parades that have this much interest tend to be the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade, and the Rose Bowl Parade.
What i just learned!Many moons ago, I knew a very old man who told me he had only seven teeth left and one of them he got when he joined the Elks Club. I never "got" the joke and this photo jogged my memory so instead of remaining ignorant, I looked up the Elks initiation ceremony a few minutes ago and found out what he meant. Very interesting. Thanks for the enlightenment.
Great ParadeWhoever thought a bunch of middle-aged guys in boaters, bow ties, and white gloves could draw such a crowd!
Hat trickI realize that's not a plumber's helper stuck to the top of the policeman's cap, but it sure looks like it.
BPOE '16Baltimore hosted the 1916 BPOE National Convention; here we see the parade of delegates who were in attendance.
L&HDefinitely reminded me of "Sons of the Desert." Still waiting for Stan and Ollie to march by with a babe on each arm. A great photo reminder, thanks.
Send in the clownsAll those people gathered just to watch a bunch of men walk down the street? At least the Shriners have funny cars and cool fezzes.
Don't get you antlers stuck in the tram wires!A lot of the flags are hanging from the support cables for the overhead tram wires. I hope they turned the juice off first. Antlers and electricity probably don't mix.
Steady ThereI am amazed at all the people watching this parade from balconies and open windows.
RubenesqueIt looks like a Pee Wee Herman parade.
That's EntertainmentWhile there are a great deal of people watching the parade, in the days before television, computers or the internet, the options for entertainment were more limited than we enjoy today. For 1916, watching a parade must have been a big deal.
Stop, my sides!"Rubenesque, It looks like a Pee Wee Herman parade."
Funniest. Title/Comment. Ever.
George Herriman's convention cartoonsI'm reminded of George "Krazy Kat" Herriman's 1907 cartoons about a convention. The comics blog Stripper's Guide had a series of these up last year. Not Elks or Sons of the Desert in this case, but Shriners. Loadsa laffs.
Learn something new ....Okay, I guess those are all 48 star flags - didn't know that .... but there's a 46-star flag above the Elk's-head banner on the top left corner - the second and fifth rows are indented!
[It's a 48-star flag. Which, as we noted below, came with the rows either lined up or staggered ("indented"). - Dave]
Two Different FlagsNote that there are both 46-star and 48-star United States flags in the picture. Arizona and New Mexico had become the newest states only four years before this picture was taken.
You can tell by the grid versus offset rows patterns of stars.
[These would all be 48-star flags, which came in both grid and staggered flavors. - Dave]
What Street?Dave, do you know what street in Balmer this is?
[I do not. - Dave]
No Fat BoysExcept for a few paunchy stomachs on some older fellas, I don't think I can see one fat American.
Useless factoidThe Elks were founded by Irish vaudevillians in NYC who needed a place to collect their mail and keep their stuff while on the road. No one wanted such transient Irish rogues around (sow biz folks, and Irish at that!), so they banded together to form this Protective Order. It then grew as an Irish club to include others besides vaudevillians, but still mostly first generation Irishman. What I'm saying is, these guys may look like Pee Wee Herman, but I wouldn't make fun of their clothes to their faces.
Baltimore StreetThis view is looking west along Baltimore Street from Holliday Street.
thats an amazing photo ofthats an amazing photo of baltimore
Good Call Baltimore BoyThe only building that seems to be still standing from 1916 is the white one on the left in the Google street view:
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Holliday+Str...
One little girl found the cameraAn amazing photograph. I wonder what sort of gear you'd need to take this with today. Spot the little colleen who has found the photographer.
The buildings that wereThe large structure on the northwest corner of East Baltimore and Guilford Streets in the approximate center of the photo (with the striped first floor) was known as the Tower Building. Constructed in 1904 (following the Great Fire) with an enormous 18-story clock tower, it housed the Maryland Casualty Company, an important local insurance firm. There is a parking lot there now.
To the right, on the northeast corner, was the Franklin Building. Five stories high, it was also built in 1904, with unusual 15-pane over 1 windows. In 1983 it housed a Little Tavern Hamburger joint in the west half of the first floor.
To its right is a building with a beautiful arched window mostly hiding behind the Olympia sign. It was built in 1908 as a Horn & Horn restaurant. Horn & Horn was a Baltimore institution through the 20th century, open 24 hours. It was a Wendy's in 1983.
The Olympia Dining Room to the right of it was built in 1912 as a simpler version of its neighbor. Also with an arched window, but without the elaborate detailing. Both were designed by theatre architects.
The building containing the Educator Shoe company in the photo was built in 1905 and was a show bar in the 1980s. The remaining Baltimore red-light district (known as The Block) is extant in the block to the east.
It's too bad the buntings are obscuring the elaborate windows and brickwork of the McGraw Hotel/Pocket Billiards building in the photo. It was built in 1904 following the fire.
The building to the far right with the large brick quoins was constructed in 1868 by Baldwin and Pennington as the German Bank. It was completely altered and modernized in 1930 as the National Central Bank.
This street corner is significant as the location of the nation's first gas street light.
This row of buildings was demolished and the parcel is occupied by a parking structure constructed in 1998.
(The Gallery, Baltimore, Harris + Ewing, Patriotic)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/07033a.thumbnail.jpg "Elks Parade: 1916")
- Paramount Winners: 1925
- ... fast crowd!
[I wonder if they need directions to the Krazy Kat. - Dave]
Bernice, is that you? The only thing that surprises ... Posted by Dave - 08/31/2012 - 8:18pm -
![May 25, 1925. Washington, D.C. "Winners, Paramount Motion Picture School." View full size. National Photo Company Collection glass negative.
Pretty Racy for 1925Wow, the woman on the far left leaves very little to the imagination with that shirt. I'm surprised she could walk around in public like that at that time never mind pose for photos.
NSFW: The 1925 EditionThis picture has been carefully reviewed and found to be not safe for the 1925 workplace! Seriously, keep those jazz-babies coming!
20's sensibilitiesI'm very surprised to see the girl on the left not wearing a bra and such a tight top.
Considering the sensibilities of the 1920's I thought her showing so much of her shape was socially unacceptable!
[Might be a good time to read up on the Roaring Twenties and the Jazz Age. F. Scott Fitzgerald, anyone? - Dave]
Fashion?What in the world is the woman on the right wearing? Is she sporting some fashion trend of the time, or did she forget her skirt? That seems to be an awfully racy outfit for 1925.
[1925 was an awfully racy year! - Dave]
Paramount WinnersWhat a shockingly fast crowd!
[I wonder if they need directions to the Krazy Kat. - Dave]
Bernice, is that you?The only thing that surprises me here is that the girl on the left has not yet bobbed her hair. What a fun and exciting time to be a woman -- too bad they didn't know what was coming.
1925 WAS a racy yearTangential: My father was in high school from 1923 to 1927. Once, in telling me a story about some high school escapades, he mentioned that he and his friends used to frequent a speakeasy in Calumet City called "The Speedway."
"You went to a bar?!? In high school? They let you in?"
"It was illegal for anyone to go to a bar in the 20s. They let everyone in."
Paramount Motion Picture SchoolAccording to an article in the July 21, 1925 New York Times, the Paramount Pictures School opened for its first class of students that month in Astoria, New York. The first class of students was Josephine Dunn, Robert Andrews, Greg Blackton, Charles Brokaw, Claud Buchanan, Walter J. Gross, John Luden, Ethelda Kenvin, Mona Palma, Lorraine Eason, Wilbur Dillon, Laverne Lindsay, Irving Hartley, Marian Ivy Harris, Harriet Krauth, Dorothy Nourse, Thelma Todd, and Charles E. Rogers.
The course lasted one year and those showing promise were to be offered contracts with Paramount Studios. The students appeared in the 1925 movie “Fascinating Youth.”
I’ve heard of Thelma Todd and Josephine Dunn; don’t know if any of the others made it big.
An earlier NY Times article says that the applications were done by district so these are probably the winners who applied at the Washington DC area.
I love old movies...Walter Goss (not Gross) is better known as Roland Drew. Charles Brokaw was successful on Broadway. John (Jack) Luden is more infamous than famous - you can check out his IMDB bio. Thelda Kenvin was a beauty queen. I think it should be Lindsay La Verne (aka Sharon Lynn/e). Charles Rogers is better known as BUDDY Rogers! Thelma Todd died under mysterious circumstances - that was one of the first real Hollywood scandals.
Some namesCharles E. Rogers is probably better known as Buddy Rogers. He appeared in the movie "Wings" which won the first Academy Award for Best Picture (and was the only silent to win what would become known as the Oscar in that category). He later married Mary Pickford in 1937 and was married to her until her death in 1979.
Charles Brokaw was primarily a stage actor. There's an 11 year gap between his appearance in "Fascinating Youth" and his next movie role.
Walter Gross (or Goss as IMDB has it) changed his name to Roland Drew. He had quite an active career until about 1945 although most of the movies he was in were either not memorable or minor parts for him. He's probably best known for playing Prince Barin in "Flash Gordon Conquers The Universe".
John "Jack" Luden is described by IMDB as having one of the saddest stories in Hollywood. The child of a wealthy family (they made cough drops) he got some good early roles but by about 1929 he was seriously addicted to heroin. He made something of a comeback in the '30s doing westerns at Columbia but even that ended. He was eventually arrested and convicted for dealing heroin and writing bad checks and died in San Quentin at age 49.
In the case of Thelma Todd, while she was a talented comedienne (she's great with the Marx Brothers in "Monkey Business" and "Horsefeathers", and her shorts with Zasu Pitts and Patsy Kelly are sometimes seen on TCM and are great) it was the manner of her death - carbon monoxide poisoning - that was the source of most of her enduring fame. Suicide? Accident? Murder? No one really knows for sure.
It's not the FiftiesI'm surprised at the surprise regarding "mores" of the Roaring Twenties, the Jazz Age, the Lost Generation, the era of speakeasies, fast cars, loose morals, flappers, a stock market that just went higher and higher based on nothing in particular ... sounds a lot like these days. I think when people think of a straitlaced past they're thinking of the Fifties. Which was pretty much an anomalously straitlaced decade in a very tumultuous century.
That said, what IS she wearing?
Bars and raciness@DTNelson -- we went to bars in high school all the time, and that was in the '70s. There was one place where we thought the unofficial motto was "Be 14 -- and prove it!" In the days before they raised the drinking age and finally cracked down on DWI, it was not uncommon at all.
And although that looks like some sort of wool bathing get-up, just take a look at the silk shifts many young women wore then -- cut low, hemmed high, stockings rolled (the equivalent of letting stocking tops show today). It was a party time.
History LessonThis discussion is what I meant about Shorpy being a a teaching tool specializing in photography and American history. It's fun. Thanks again, Dave and Ken.
(The Gallery, D.C., Movies, Natl Photo)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/13652u.thumbnail.jpg "Paramount Winners: 1925")
- The Smoking Dog: 1927
- ... old when all the cool artists were hanging out at the Krazy Kat Club.
That's it! The crazy kind of yard sale art I love ... Posted by Dave - 09/13/2011 - 11:53pm -
![March 18, 1927. Washington, D.C. "Margo Couzens, daughter of Senator Couzens." An heiress whose early life might be outlined thusly: aspiring artiste; leadfoot horn-honker; teenage bride (eloped); hothead horn-honker; divorcee. National Photo Company Collection glass negative. View full size.
PowerThis young woman is an explosion of talent and passion.
Self Portrait with Hat and Bow TieShe earned extra money on weekends fighting pitbulls.
Why so serious?It's the deadpan look on her face that makes this so funny. I love it.
A graduate ofthe C.M. Coolidge School of Anthropomorphized Dog Art.
A quick courtshipFrom the Feb. 17, 1930 Time Magazine "People" section:
Senator James Couzens of Michigan, meeting William Jeffries Chewning Jr., his son-in-law [and first husband of daughter Margo], for the first time at lunch in Washington, told reporters: "He seems a very nice chap."
Five years later, the same column would report the couple's separation.
Haughty HonkerA simple tale to remind us that inflated self-importance is hardly a new phenomenon.
Washington Post, Sep 21, 1933
Mrs. Chewning to Face Court for Horn Honk
A prolonged blast from automobile.
Town Sergt. Alton Shumate, of Falls Church, Va., holding traffic at an intersection for the first apparatus answering an alarm, sends boy to request the motorist to cease blowing the horn because there is a fire.
The impatient lady motorist refuses to cease. Up steps a courteous man, who explains traffic is being held for the fire equipment. "You'll be delayed only a minute," he says, "Please quit blowing your horn."
"The idea of holding us," she says. "This is some hick town."
"This may be a hick town, but I happen to be the mayor here and also the town judge," he returned.
Unimpressed, the lady continues to express voluminous and forceful opinion of the town and its officials.
Then the sergeant comes up and orders the lady to the curb.
"You know who I am?" the lady demands.
"I don't know, and I don't care." the sergeant replies, handing her a summons to appear in the mayor's court Saturday night to answer charges of making unnecessary noise, in violation of the town ordinance.
The lady was Mrs. Margo Couzens Chewning, daughter of Senator James Couzens. She was accompanied by her husband, William Jeffries Chewning.
The summons was accepted - and on Saturday night Mrs. Chewning must face Mayor L.P. Daniel of the hick town, who presides as judge in said hick town.
P.S. - the fire proved to be near Cabin John, Md., on the other side of the river.
Washington Post, Sep 23, 1933
Couzens' Daughter Abandons Battle in Horn-Honking
Horn-honking at Falls Church won't get Mrs. Margo Couzens Chewning, daughter of Senator James Couzens, Michigan, into the town court tonight after all. She decided it was worth $2 to let the incident drop.
Her attorney, John C. Mackall, announced he was posting that amount as collateral on Mrs. Chewing's summons and would forfeit it.
Previously her husband, William Jeffries Chewning, said he would fight the case because he believed she was being persecuted.
The trouble started with Mrs. Chewning got into a controversy with Mayor L.P. Daniel, of Falls Church, about blowing her horn when traffic was halted by fire apparatus.
In ResidenceIt appears that in 1930 William and Margaret Chewning were in residence in the 2400 block of Massachusetts Avenue, NW. They apparently lived in a large apartment house, but it is not clear which one.
You clearly don't understandthe mind and delicate emotional needs of an arteeste. Did the cops not understand she can't bear to wait for such plebeian events like buildings that are ablaze.
Great shoes though.
Get a job!The Mayflower Hotel in Washington announced that William Jeffries Chewning Jr., young bank clerk who eloped with Margo, daughter of millionaire Senator James Couzens of Michigan, would become one of its assistant managers, would report for work daily at 8 a.m. in frock coat and grey trousers, would take up "a receptive post in the main lobby."
Time Magazine, Oct. 13, 1930
Guilty!Put her behind bars for pretending to paint in a dress, stockings and heels.
Ms MargoThe Paris Hilton of the last century's DC elite.
So she's the one!I always wondered who the inspiration for this fine piece of art was.
A real handful, true,but what adventures taming that fiery beast!
Fast livingEarly life indeed -- Margo was born in 1910, so she's just a teenager here, and some Googling around shows she separated from her second husband (the persecuted Mr. Chewning, of course) in 1935. One hopes things eventually calmed down a bit.
Honk, HonkI see, she is a graduate of "DON'T YOU KNOW WHO I AM" school of social interaction. Being in a political family she must of been granted her a full scholarship.
Margo, the PrequelMiss Entitlement's first horn-honking incident. The roadster is the car she would elope in the following year.
Washington Post, May 5, 1929.
DAUGHTER OF SENATOR
RUNS AUTO INTO TWO MEN
Margo Couzens and Her Friends Take Pair to Hospital
Dressed in her riding togs and driving her new roadster with three persons whom she was giving a lift from the Riding and Hunt Club to the Wardman Park Saddle Club horse show, Miss Margo Couzens, 18-year-old daughter of Senator James Couzens, of Michigan, knocked down and critically injured George Brown, colored, 53 years old, 1912 Thirteenth street northwest, a mason, on Massachusetts avenue northwest, at the Rock Creek Park entrance.
Brown, physicians at Emergency Hospital believe, has a fractured skull as a result. His companion, Henry Watkins, colored, 114 L street southwest, escaped unharmed when the automobile bore down on them. The accident, according to police of the Eighth Precinct, occurred at 12:40 o'clock yesterday afternoon.
Both men were walking across the intersection as the roadster approached them, Miss Couzens said last night. Miss Couzens sounded her horn to warn them, and the two colored men stepped apart, startled by the signal, she said. Then Watkins turned and shouted to his companion to join him, and Brown ran toward him across the path of the automobile.
Miss Couzens said she applied her brakes instantly after sounding the warning and seeing the confused actions of the two men. The automobile, she said, came to a quick stop, the wheels being locked by the brakes. Brown was knocked down and dragged a short distance by the automobile. According to miss Couzens, he was carried only several feet.
With the aid of her companions, Miss Couzens placed the injured man in the automobile and took him to Emergency Hospital. ... At the hospital Miss Couzens was visibly excited and nervous over the accident, according to police. ...
Driver's Ed, 1929"When 'colored' persons are encountered crossing the road, stopping (or even slowing) is hardly necessary. Simply sound the horn until they scatter like chickens, and proceed apace."
1911-1976Margo Couzens Chewning Bryant died July 5, 1976, at Fauquier Hospital in Warrenton, Virginia, aged 64 or 65.
I Hope You're Sitting DownI am compelled to show the odd similarities between this and the cover of my former band's first album, Lambchop's "I Hope You're Sitting Down", as painted by our lead guy, Kurt Wagner.
Finally, someone who knew who she was.From UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE, INC. FOR RELEASE MONDAY. JANUARY 14, 1935 AND THEREAFTER.
THE DAILY WASHINGTON MERRY-GO-ROUND
SENATORS' DAUGHTERS
In Washington, it's never safe to assume a superior attitude, regardless of who you may be, or to whom you may think you're talking.
Mrs. William Jeffries Chewning Jr., erstwhile Margot Couzens, daughter of Croesan Senator James Couzens of Michigan, went shopping recently at a fashionable Washington department store. She made a small purchase, and in payment presented a very large check, Explaining that the banks were closed and she needed some cash over the weekend.
The salesgirl, very pleasantly, replied that she could not cash so large a check, as much as she would like to. Retorted Margot: "But I've got to get it cashed, I've been dealing here for years. It's perfectly good.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Chewning," reiterated the salesgirl. "We have strict orders not to cash checks above a certain figure."
Mrs. Chewning, not accustomed to having her checks rejected, was keenly annoyed. "That's all very well," she replied, "but do you know who I am? I'm Senator Couzens' daughter."
The salesgirl nodded pleasantly, "Oh, yes; I know quite well. You see, I'm Senator Nye's daughter."
Born too lateMiss Thing is probably miffed that she was only eleven years old when all the cool artists were hanging out at the Krazy Kat Club.
That's it!The crazy kind of yard sale art I love to chance upon.
(The Gallery, D.C., Natl Photo, Portraits)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/16456u.thumbnail.jpg "The Smoking Dog: 1927")
- Boho Wedding: 1922
- ... look marvelous and immediately reminded me of all the Krazy Kat Klub pictures seen here , here , and here .
The Better ... Posted by Dave - 07/27/2012 - 4:46pm -
!["Better 'Ole Wedding." Informal nuptials circa 1922 at the Better 'Ole, a Greenwich Villagey "bohemian" nightspot in Washington, D.C., that, while short-lived, made its mark. In 1935 the Washington Post called it "the first real night club of the so-called 'night club era.' " The article continues: "It was started by Charles W. Smith, now the noted black-and-white artist, had a membership charge of $1 and was located on the second floor of a three-story building at 1515 U Street. A hot colored dance orchestra held forth in a room decorated with drapes in a sort of cubist style." More here. National Photo Co. glass negative. View full size.
Couple In the BoothHer expression is most likely due to her being caught in mid-word and blinking her eyes just as the flash powder went off. Sort of like those photos of celebrities that make them look like blithering, drooling imbeciles that certain periodicals like to publish under screaming headlines such as "BRAD BEBOP GOES BERSERK!" Also, notice that she seems to have another one of those massive floral memorials growing from her midriff, so maybe she's a bridesmaid or maid of honor. Boyfriend, who I bet she's holding hands with under the table, has a big carnation, so maybe he was best man or other wedding functionary.
An Odd ReligionIt's an odd religion that will marry a man to a unicorn with a flower garden growing up her front.
The two in the booth at the right have already passed out, and they haven't even started serving the liquor yet!
Bridal BouquetThat's the bride's bouquet, composed of rosebuds and ferns, which she has tucked into her belt. Check out the wonderful cut-work on her sleeves. This is some boho bunch. I hope they had a long and happy life together.
LiquorThis was 1922. The Great Experiment (Prohibition to us) had begun a couple of years before. No booze to be found here - nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more.
What a beautiful group!What is the bride wearing??
These people look marvelous and immediately reminded me of all the Krazy Kat Klub pictures seen here, here, and here.
The Better 'OleLines from the 1919 play based on the cartoons
12
"Let's get out of
this damn 'ole!"
13
"If you knows of a
better 'ole - go to it."
http://www.geocities.com/emruf5/betterole.html
the IMDB entry for the 1926 film of the play
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0016643/
Shave and a haircutThe groom looks like he had a recent shave and haircut but he should have shined his shoes!
Bride and GroomThis was no shotgun wedding. The couple appear to be in their 40s. That would put the parents in another world or in a distant place in this world. It would be interesting to find out who the couple were and what happened to them.
Good WoodSorry for a 2nd comment, but I just noticed the wood that the booth seats and tables are made from. Another nice example of how cool wood was back then. The tabletop looks like one solid piece (which probably tried to warp up at each side as it dried out due to its position of the rings). The sides of the booth is what gets me. It's huge! Even if it's joined with another board at the centerline, it's still big compared to what we can get these days at a standard lumberyard. Hell, it's hard to even find plywood that straight any more.
Reefer MadnessThe couple in the booth on the right look like they have already started their (no turning back) descent into the perils of the evil weed. Beware when two people are both keeping their hands under the table. There is a Walter Mondale lookalike, but taller, about third or fourth from the left of the photo (just to the right of the ceiling lantern) who may have been an ancestor to W.M. And last, but not least, notice there are no old people there, even the clergyman cannot be more than 55 or 60. Obviously these kids were smart Alec whippersnappers, as no parents were invited. Still, its a smart looking, well-dressed and very happy crowd, even though the bride and groom should be holding hands. All in all, F. Scott Fitzgerald would be proud.
FlowersAre the bride's flowers a huge corsage, or a bouquet tucked into her belt? I've never seen such a large corsage and I just wondered if it was the style at the time.
"Better 'Ole""The Better 'Ole" was a comedy about World War I (unlikely though that may seem) based on a British cartoon series. The 'Ole in the title is a Cockney-fied version of Hole, i.e., Trench.
But in this case, it's referring to a nightclub in DC that the Post described on 10/7/21: "the city's latest acquisition in the line of places for Bohemians to gather." The story story goes on to say that the dishwasher absconded with the opening night's take--65 bucks.
[Ooh. Fantastic. Thanks! - Dave]
Wedding PartyWow. This is one of the best photos ever. People gathered for a festive occasion in a rustic setting. I love the women's clothes and hats and jewelry. The men all look dashing. Everyone seems to be in a happy frame of mind.
On other posts people have commented on how "dressed up" people were for ordinary occasions in this era. Of course this is a special occasion, but it seems we have lost something in our clothing fashions of today. I have been to weddings where young people and not so young have attended in jeans with bare midriffs. In a church. It is nice to see photos of an era, where looking nice and acting nice was not considered putting on airs.
The Better 'Ole, Cont'd.A 1923 Washington Post column ("After the Curfew") recalls that "the Bohemian atmosphere was first obtained by locating the club in an alley over a garage. Here one dined, and drank, with the smell of gasoline and the noise of cars. The popularity of the place was instantaneous, all of the younger set flocked there. They danced in a two by-four space with great delight, and endured the million and one other discomforts of the place for the sake of the so called Bohemian touch, which for some unknown reason is considered very romantic. The owners of the club seemed to thrive financially and they decided that the club should have better quarters, so they moved into a better building, and a better part of town. They attempted to take the Bohemian touch, which had been so successful, to the new place. To do this they had an elaborate decorative scheme carried out. Stripes, awnings, pictures and rough wooden tables, and all. The real atmosphere was lost, however, and while the young Washingtonians still frequent the place, it is now merely another place to go to dine and dance. There is not much of the Bohemian in the hours of opening or closing, both being the regular times. And there is nothing unusual about the conduct of the guests while there. That is, nothing unusual for this day and age. If some of the original Bohemians could really see what the modern youth does in their names they would probably be horribly shocked."
Hair HornsCan someone tell me what the woman thats standing behind the groom is wearing on her forehead? Is that a hairstyle?
Special Guest AppearanceFeaturing a special guest appearance by Woodrow Wilson, as the man in the frock.
HairstyleThe lady behind the groom is wearing what, in a time with less elevated
sensitivities, were called "spit curls." Some ladies with longish bangs found it
convenient to moisten their hair with saliva before they curled the hair around
a finger. A bobby pin kept things in order until they dried.
At times my mother wore her bangs in a similar arrangement, although she
preferred a single curl over the left side of her forehead to the double style.
My congratulations to the photographer. There is a possibility he used the
new fangled photoflash bulbs that were just coming in, but this picture was
probably taken on a Graphic, or Graflex, with flash powder.
How it looks todayI work on U St. and had to go out and grab a few photos. Here's the composite:
Wedding of Dutch Whelan and Mary McCaffreyThe photo was taken on November 17, 1921 by the National Photo Co. news agency in Washington. They captioned it: "A Bohemian wedding in true Washington Square style was staged in Washington today when Frederick (Dutch) Whelan and Mary McCaffray were married at the “Better Ole” an Alley Coffee House much frequented by the intelligentsia, by the Rev. Dr. J. J. Simon of St. Andrews Church. The couple met a few weeks ago at the “Ole” and wooed to the music of the wild ukelala, hence the wedding at the unconventional place selected. The next day the DC paper ran the picture with the headline "Dutch Whalen, DC Tom-tom Beater Weds Artists Model" with the accompanying story:
“Who said romance lies unconscious in the hospital, disarmed and dehydrated? Dutch Whelan, popular tom-tom beater for Washington folks who shuffle was off the glazing floor, wasn’t worrying about proving romance was still showing a good pulse yesterday afternoon when his wedding xylophone sounded at the Better Ole. Though he proved it right, Dutch’s interest was centered in his bride, Miss Mary E. McCaffrey, whom he met one night two weeks ago as he was on the job playing ”The Rose of Washington Square.” Two weeks, a Greenwich Village background, music and a model’s platform for an altar – certainly romance is still deadly even if tucked away in an alley at the rear of the Burlington Hotel.
(The Gallery, D.C., Eateries & Bars, Natl Photo, Weddings)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/30107u.thumbnail.jpg "Boho Wedding: 1922")
- Hidden Washington: 1923
- ... the building on the right with the double doors is the Krazy Kat.
Hucksters and arabbers I see in a previous posting, that such ... Posted by Dave - 04/20/2013 - 9:15pm -
!["Produce wagon in city, 1923." One in a series of Harris & Ewing plates showing the alleys and backstreets of Washington, D.C. The subject here is a Chaconas grocery wagon. Who can identify the dome? 4x5 glass negative. View full size.
Time capsulesI love these vintage "back alley" urban street scenes The little details. What's cool is that these back alleys pretty much retain all the architectural details ( windows, gutters, cast iron, masonry) even to this day. If you wander down any old urban area alley-ways it's as if going back in time.
Shades of my childhoodThe ragman cometh!
Window AlterationRight above the double doors to the right of the car there's an arched window that appears to have been closed after the building was built. But the upper floor door/window must have been there from the start which makes me think this was a correction during construction and not after. I wonder if the upper floor was originally designed with a smaller window but a last minute requirement changed that.
Portland FlatsThe dome appears to be that of the Portland Flats apartment building that stood at Thomas Circle bounded by 14th Street and Vermont Avenue, NW.
Alley Shot From Last MonthThis photo is fascinating.
On another forum I belong to, we were discussing alleyways of Washington. Here's a photo I took right off Thomas Circle, behind the modern office building I was working at that month, just off 14th Street and Vermont Avenue, NW.
Evidently this old carriage house is now a bar.
Building on rightYes, the dome does indeed appear to be the Portland Flats, which is often called Washington's first luxury apartments. The only extant building in the photo are the stables on the extreme right, which is currently a bar called the Green Lantern.
Headlight lensThe V in green was unique for early-1921 on the Ford truck.
Looks FamiliarI'm pretty sure the building on the right with the double doors is the Krazy Kat.
Hucksters and arabbersI see in a previous posting, that such a wagon was referred to as a "huckster wagon". This reminds me of the Baltimore "arabbers" who drove throughout the city selling fruits and vegetables. I don't think most of the arabbers were affiliated with any grocery store - just independent businessmen.
As a youngster in Balto during the 1950s, I would see wagons full of watermelons or bananas - unloaded from the docks, and straight to the far-flung neighborhoods.
Arabbers were still doing business in Balto at the turn of this century, but lost their city-provided stables.
Related to this type of business, I remember men carrying grinding wheels on their backs - offering to sharpen ypur kitchen knives. Times have changed.
Hidden IndeedI am sure I just have not paid any attention to it before.
But after looking at around 175 images so far, you would think that I would have seen how that horse is being tied in some other image here as well.
I am thinking almost for certain that is a portable device and not one that is affixed to the ground, and just the weight of that object is enough to convey to the horse that is it indeed securely tied and has not chance of moving.
A simple device that the makers of even took the time to give a distinct shape and form, when any random object of similar weight would do.
One of the reasons I Love this site, is seeing things like this that were common place from that time, and are now extremely rare to see again that the everyday practical use.
That dynamic for me is so clearly demonstrated in this wonderful image.
[There is a "horse weight" in at least one other image here, although I don't remember which one. - Dave]
Hee HawJudging by the animal, I would guess this was a Democratic ward.
Horse WeightsThere is one found here:
https://www.shorpy.com/node/9523
Re: Hidden IndeedRegarding the horse weight, it was noted in this image previously:
https://www.shorpy.com/node/5130
Juxtaposition/ Transitionof/from the old and to the new, the horses/wagons in the front and the Model T truck to the right. Move over, guys, horseless is the way to go.
Horse WeightYou will find one in this image-
https://www.shorpy.com/node/14793
"Horse, Buggy, Tether, Hitch etc. Weight"Weights came in many shapes, styles and heft. Usually always connected, they were simply lifted by the long chain or rope and placed at the drivers feet when not in use. You can actually see one in use by a Doctor in a popular move but I'll be darned if I can remember which one. When the Doctor parks his buggy, he steps off, grabs the rope attached to the weight from the floorboard, walks to the horse and plops the weight on the ground.
About that blocked upper doorThat building probably was a horse stable. Those upper doors were where hay was loaded into the building. There would have been a hole in the upper floor inside the building down through which the hay was tossed when it was Dobbin's feeding time.
+93Below is the same view from May of 2016.
(The Gallery, D.C., Harris + Ewing, Horses, Stores & Markets)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/SHORPY_42919a.thumbnail.jpg "Hidden Washington: 1923")
- High Bridge: 1865
- ... to every new post here (specifically been digging on the Krazy Kat Club series...sad to see you've reached the bottom of the barrel on ... Posted by Dave - 08/05/2012 - 4:38pm -
- En Pointe: 1925
- ...
Lovely I love this. It may have to replace the Krazy Kat Klub https://www.shorpy.com/node/2827 on my desktop.
(The ... Posted by Dave - 10/07/2013 - 10:58am -
- Dano's Roadhouse: 1938
- ... This looks like so much fun! When I'm not lounging at the Krazy Kat, you'll find me dancing at this roadhouse. Laissez les bons temps ... Posted by Dave - 04/11/2008 - 1:20pm -
- The Art of War: 1918
- ... defense Then there was lil' Ignatz, chuckin' 'em at Krazy Kat. Or am I missing the message contained in this poster?
Patriotic ... Posted by Dave - 08/29/2012 - 2:08pm -
- New Year's Eve 1956
- ... My votes go to the 1925 office Christmas party and the Krazy Kat series.
[This year we have the "user-customizable countdown." ... Posted by tterrace - 09/29/2011 - 7:12pm -
![December 31, 1956 (or January 1, 1957). A party my brother, then 19, went to. Other than recognizing a couple family friends, that's all I know about this Ektachrome slide. View full size.
Village People"Photo by Patrick McGoohan."
SphereThanks, No. 6; I was trying to come up with some snappy remark about the pink balloon, but I gave up.
Conception DayThis is truly wild: my mother always told me that December 31, 1956, was the night I was conceived. Now I know what was going on and what people were doing!
Shorpy Countdown!Hey Dave, where's the Shorpy Top 20 Images Countdown of 2008?! My votes go to the 1925 office Christmas party and the Krazy Kat series.
[This year we have the "user-customizable countdown." Whichever photo you like the most wins! - Dave]
(ShorpyBlog, Member Gallery, New Year, tterrapix)](https://www.shorpy.com/files/images/ny1956_0.thumbnail.jpg "New Year's Eve 1956")
- Just Add Ocean: 1921
- ... beautiful Iola Swinnerton, second from left with the Krazy Kat doll. View full size.
Easy switch No swimming today ? ... Posted by Dave - 07/06/2018 - 10:19pm -
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