Since trains have been a common theme lately on many Sepia Saturday Posts Ive had to dig around a little as I went all out on my first one throwing various train photos together.
Since the photo prompt at http://sepiasaturday.blogspot.com/ has the front of a Railway Co. that says “Carriers of Goods and Livestock” I thought hmmm, here we have what looks like a SP (Southern Pacific?) train car, and Im not sure if its transporting Mail? Or you could say “Transporting Mail and Men in Sailor Hats”
This came from my Ernie Kolleas Collection, that will soon be leaving me. As a result of this blog it will be reuniting with family that went through google and happened upon my blog. 🙂 That is always the neatest messages to hear, someone who is a relative or someone who knows someone in the photos you rescued.
Now my guess is this is a train car carrying mail? Yeah you never knew a bunch of Coast Guard gentlemen were standing all over your letters now did you? Or is it trash? Im looking at all the boxes laying down around it? So Im really not sure what to make of this but maybe someone else will know. Maybe they were “going green” and recycling? 🙂
On the back of this photo which is part of a photo album it says ” For Donald C. Haas with thanks Isabelle (or Isabella) Crowell or Cowell.
You can always click the images for more of a closeup
Some other goodies from this same album, these first two were the ending to the album and 5 x 7 shots.
I really love these casual ones, its seems this albums features probably fellow coast guard mates and their wives, as its various shots like these with couples, some in front of travel type trailers or just camped out like the ones below.
This one I just love, it says on the back “Smith River Picnic Oct. 1943 Glozas and Rudy”
This last photo I just had to post, because of the photo and what it says on the back. I love photos of houses. I love historical homes and homes people have restored and saved. I always wonder when I find old photos of houses if these places are still standing.
Right now Im trying to help a friend get her home registered as a historical landmark, but we are running into a lack of information on her home, which is old for our area, but it seems with all of the old history photos of our town, theres not one shot of her place, and we only have one main starting point in this town but all cut off near her place, we are looking for 1902. But the earliest photos we have are from the 1960s-70s. So I know how precious an older photo is! And sometimes just seeing a home that once exsisted that may have been torn down forever lost, but not always if photos live on.
So here is one of those snapshots I love.
Says on the back “Our house at 830 South 20th – Arlington. Louise standing on the porch at 7 1/2 months pregnant” Below this photo in the album it says “Tony and Louise Gloza” so perhaps this is the Gloza home.
I took a break at this point for several hours while writing this and then went on the hunt to see if I could find where this house was exactly, typed in the address first, found this street in Indiana, but no luck. Tried again, then added Arlington, and bingo, its in VA. By using Google Maps I have found this house is still there! It was built in 1938, I wonder if the Glozas were the first to live here. You can see the house today below!
There are so many more photos, names and people in this particular album so Im not sure who is the main person of this album, maybe the relative will be able to narrow it down.
I hope you have enjoyed these photos as much as I have!
savethephotos 
Yes I did enjoy them, thank you! Like you, I find the casual ones of people relaxing partcularly appealing. The one of the lady on the porch looks like a candidate for Dear Photograph.
I like now and then photos of houses and it’s so nice to see a house looking better now than it did back then. I think the Coast Guard men are starting early recycling. ;-D
I do hope that top photo isn’t of the mail! It doesn’t look at all safe. I love that the little house still remains, and so well preserved, it seems.
They look as though they are having fun at the picnic. It must have been very satisfying to find that house still standing, I very enjoyable post.
If the first picture is from WWII, I think it is paper collected in a scrap drive.
I love that the family found you and the collection is being reunited with them. Very kind of you to part with them too.
These are great pictures. Finding that Google picture of the house is sort of eery, isn’t it?
Thank you for reuniting these memories with their family! What a treasure this is for them.
You pick up a theme and run with it like a true champion. Always a pleasure to visit your blog to see what you have come up with. Great images and great background information.
I think Postcardy is right, the empty card board boxes suggest to me that they have been emptied into the train car, and the manner in which those men are standing on it doesn’t really suggest mail does it.
In the second photo they appear to be sailors, but not on board ship. Are they pretending that they’re about to “cross the line”?
Well done with finding the Gloza home – I think you could probably find the family without too much difficulty. The 1930 Census shows only 23 GLOZAs in the US, mostly in Illinois and Pennsylvania, but no Tonys (or Anthonys), so perhaps he immigrated in the early 1930s.
I agree that that looks like a paper drive. Fascinating that some are in plaid shirts. I’m guessing that wasn’t part of the uniform.
How pleased you must be to be able to reunite photos with families. That is a gift! My favorite of all these is the men in the rail car shot from above them. Really had me wondering how and why it was taken. A paper drive is likely. But that they all climbed in the rail car? Well an enjoyable post to look over.
My father Ernie Kolleas passed away two years ago. I am his eldest daughter. My husband says that plaid shirts were a part of the Coast Guard uniform. My dad would be thrilled about the pictures and even more
your comments. Thank you so much, everyone. Since seeing the original set of train and coast guard pics here, I have joined Ancestry.com and found lots of documents including the ship’s manifest for Ernie’s dad, Panagiotis (Pete) Kolleas coming from Greece to Ellis Island. Bye now.