Campbelltown Library has purchased around 250 amazing photographs of Campbelltown dating back to
the 1960s, 70s and 80s. In 2013 Fairfax Media sent the two million photograph
archive of the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper to a company in Little Rock,
Arkansas to be digitized. The scanning company was disbanded prior to
completing the scanning, and the work was eventually managed by a court
receiver. Part of the deal Fairfax made was to trade the vintage prints for the
scanning services. From the turmoil in the scanning company, the archive
eventually became bank owned by a regional Arkansas bank with no interest in
holding these photographs. After much discussion and negotiation, Duncan Miller
Gallery in Santa Monica, CA bought the entire collection of vintage photos,
with the goal and purpose of repatriating many of these historical documents
back to Australia.
The photographs are an extremely
valuable and interesting addition to our photo collection. They cover
everything from street scenes to people and buildings, with many filling a gap
in the records. There’s even a whole folder on the exhumation of graves from
the Presbyterian Cemetery in the 1980s! An exhibition of this valuable
collection is planned in the near future.
Written by Andrew Allen
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