When Photos Lead Genealogists Astray

While researching my wife's ancestry, I came across a photo of her great great grandparents from a photographer in Harlan, Iowa. Her grandparents and great grandparents lived in that area, but this was the first evidence I had seen that her great great grandparents had immigrated from Denmark and lived around Harlan.

So, that photo shows Marianne Jacobsdatter Keldgord and Peder Christensen Keldgord, my wife's 2nd great grandparents. Notice on the bottom, the photographer was Dammand from Harlan Iowa. Now, I see a lot of things that I don't believe. These days, someone who is handy with powerful software can manipulate images and even videos. But this was a photo from the 19th century. It sure seemed to prove that these people were in Harlan Iowa to get the picture taken.

But I never found other evidence that they were in Harlan.

Then I found another family photo.

Okay, well that is Marianne and Peder, again, along with two of their younger children, who I believe to be, Karen and Charles. This one credited to a photographer in Denmark. It would have been taken around 1870.

Notice that Marianne and Peder are exactly the same in the two photos. Apparently, at this early stage of photography, they were able to copy other photographs by taking a picture of them, and blocking out unwanted features. In this case, I suppose the family had few pictures of their parents and wanted to make copies. They didn't want to see themselves in the photo so had the photographer block them out.

Seeing is not  believing, but maybe this photo is worth a thousand words. It does provide evidence, not that Marianne and Peder were in Iowa, but that they were not in Iowa, or else their kids would have actually had their photos taken. 

Looking back at the photo, it is a good job. But a white background. Very unusual. That should have been a clue that this was not an original photo.