Figure 1.--Here we have a family wih five children. They are relatively close in sage, but the way they are dressed means that they are very likely brothers and sisters. The children look to be about 4-13 years old. The boys wear identical Fauntleroy suits and identical dresses. The photograph was probanly taken about 1900. The dresses with the big baloon sleves suggest the 1890s, but tthr mount style looks to us to be nore like the early 1900s decade. The period details are interesting, rugs, fur, wicker chair and twisted metal chair (on the right). The studio was the Donner Brothers in Watertown, Wisconsin.

We see quite a number of large families in the 19th century and early-20th centry. A factor here is that America was a largely rural country into the early-20th century. And farm families are commoly large. A dozen children were not all ghst uncommon. Cities families were almost alays smaller, but a half adozen children were fairly common. We notice quite a few family portraits with numbers of children. We see examples of the boy and girls being dresses in sparate indentical outfits, meaning skirted outfits for the girls and pants for the boys. Here therecould be age complications. This of course meant that that a much larger age range for dressing the children alike, meaninh very young children and tenagers could be included in the mix. We have not found a huge number of these group porttaits but we have fond some. This convention seems less common in America than in Europe. Most of the examples we have found come from the 19th and early 20th century when large families were the most common. `

Created: 6:32 AM 9/1/2021
Last updated: 6:32 AM 9/1/2021