I received 4 more photos from the “Reed Collection”. 3 are tin-types of Pryor women from Gallatin, TN and one is of Buster Simmons, the son of Ann Eliza Pryor and a grandson of Allen L. Pryor. The tin photo were pretty dark with age, but I did my best to bring out the images with Photoshop. One of the photos is of Lucy Pryor, also a daughter of Allen L. Pryor. It helps to tie together the photos of the Pryor women already noted in the collection… they all wore am exceedingly large bead necklace in their photos! It look like the strands of giant Austrailian pearls. Read NY Times Article on Big Pearls
More photos have arrived! They are now on the website and ready for viewing. The question is… do we actually have photos of all of Allen L. Pryor’s children. I have a photo of Lycurgus Lafayette Pryor when he was quite elderly. Did he have a tin-type made in the 1870’s when the rest of the family went in to Gallatin for their portraits? There must be a story to them having their portraits done. Allen L. Pryor’s wife died in 1865, I wonder how he got all these teens and young adults to show up for a photograph! Where was Lycurgus and William T. at this time?
See The Reed Collection for photos of Allen L. Pryor and his children (see photos)
Allen L. Pryor photo arrived! It’s terrific. I’ve added it to the The Reed Collection page and the photo is now viewable within the website. Dating these photos is really tricky. I’m fairly good and figuring out the date of women’s clothing from a bussell or neckline, but men’s clothing — especially when you have just a photo from the chest up– are very hard to date. When were men wearing the short ties like in this photo? Allen L. Pryor was born in 1816… was this pre-Civil War?
I heard from another researcher who sent a copy of the death certificate on one of the Jackson County Pryors– Serena Elizabeth Pryor, wife of Wesley Marion Anderson. It identifies her parents as Alfred Pryor and Serena Dill. Having her mother’s surname looks to be new information. I found that I had more Dills in my database… Nancy Jane Pryor Nelson who is suspected to be another daughter of Alfred and Serena, had a son named Joseph Nelson who married Nancy Jane Harris who was a daughter a Mr. Harris and Patience Dill.
Another photo?… more than 150 years old!!!!!I heard from another “cousin” who has more old photos of the Sumner County Pryors. Amazing… he has a photo of Allen L. Pryor that’s probably earlier than any other known photo. It’s without his beard and probably from around 1850. He also has photos a couple more of Allen L.’s daughters. It’s interesting how you can work on the the family tree for 20 years and suddenly new resources surface. I am so thankful that these photos are being shared. I hate to think of them in a box and getting tossed out when someone’s house is cleaned out.
I’m amazed by the old photos from this “cousin’s” collection. Even if it sounds cliche, they are a window to the past. I loved looking at the clothes from the 1860’s and 1870’s. They look different than how they were interpreted 60 years later in “Gone With the Wind”. It’s interesting to study the faces to similarities to try to pair people up into family groups. 40 photos are now on the website and ready for identification. I hate to think of all the family history and old photos getting thrown out, lost or left in a drawer– that was a motivation to start the website. I don’t want to be the only one who has these photos so I’ve put 300dpi (print quality) files on Shutterfly.com. Shutterfly is reasonably priced, great quality, not too hard to figure out. Whomever wants prints of the photos now will have access to them! SEE PHOTOS