Archives West Finding Aid

The Charles Rogers Photographs collection consists of glass and film negatives as well as photographic prints. All of the images in the collection appear to have been taken between 1892 and 1935, and most were taken by Charles, though it is likely other members of the Rogers family continued taking photographs after Charles Rogers’ death. Rogers primarily used a wooden camera to produce the glass plate negatives. Approximately half of the glass plate negatives are 5”x 7” while the other half are 4”x 5”. The film negatives have a greater degree of variation in size, with a number of sizes between 4”x 5” and 1.5”x 2.5”.

The majority of the photographs in the collection were taken in the Pacific Northwest; other locations include California, New York, Canada, and Alaska. The collection includes personal family photographs and commercial prints. The collection showcases scenes of rural life from the time period as well as cityscapes and family portraits. Rogers had a particular interest in the railroad and ships so there are a number of photographs showing wrecks, train engines, and labor operations.

The 300s series appears to focus on the railroad in the Pacific Northwest, as well as buildings and construction in Spokane Washington.

The 500s series largely features human subjects, and other scenes depicting life in the 1892-1935 time period.

The 700s series features fishing, hunting, agricultural life, photographs from trips to Alaska and Portland Oregon, and children enjoying a beach day.

The 1000s series appears to be made up of mostly family photographs, including both personal family photographs and photographs taken of other families; photographs from trips to California, Oregon, and Canada; photographs of a large ship and a train wreck; as wells as photographs of cityscapes.

The 900s series does not appear to have any unique or distinct themes in terms of subject; it includes cityscapes; nature scenes; images of ships, trains, and automobiles; group photographs and individual portraits; photographs depicting hunting and agricultural labor; as well as photographs of construction work and individual buildings.

Images that were previously stored loosely, or in envelopes with multiple other items but no description, have been individually filed in box 3. Items in box 3 were assigned numbers 1-153, and were described by the processor. The subjects of these photographs were primarily children and families; groups of people; as well as some nature scenes and cityscapes.