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The Lost Photographs of Osbert Sumner

Indianapolis Special Collections Room (ISCR) Program

Join us in the Indianapolis Special Collections Room (ISCR) at the Central Library to learn about the lost photographs of Osbert Sumner.

Culture, History, and Society: Historic Indianapolis—In 1898, Osbert Sumner (1873-1932) was given a camera by his coworkers after leaving his position at a downtown wholesale grocery. With it, he captured a unique perspective of Indianapolis at the turn of the twentieth century.

His glass negatives were left under the basement stairs of his home in Irvington, where they remained hidden for decades, only to be discovered by future owners who donated them to the Irvington Historical Society. There were no names, no dates, just a cache of incredible images waiting to be identified, more than 300 of them.

For more than seven years, researchers at the Irvington Historical Society have worked to identify the people, places, and stories depicted in the images. Please join Deedee Davis, Irvington Historical Society board member and Reference Archivist for the Indianapolis City-County Archives, as she discusses the collaborative research process and the discoveries that offer a largely unseen perspective of early Indianapolis.

Location: This program will be held in person in the Indianapolis Special Collections Room (ISCR) on the 6th floor of Central Library.

Parking: The Central Library has a parking garage available to patrons during their time there. Garage pricing information is detailed here. The garage can be accessed on Pennsylvania Street.

This program is part of the Culture, History, and Society: Historic Indianapolis programs hosted by the Indianapolis Special Collections Room (ISCR). Made possible through gifts to The Indianapolis Public Library Foundation.

Contact: Special Collections Librarian Montoya Barker

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