Some pretty amazing images, hard to believe over a century old
The 1906 Great Earthquake of San Francisco in colour: never-before-seen photos uncovered a century later in the Smithsonian
The first colour images of what is considered the worst natural disaster in U.S. history have emerged, showing in beautiful and horrific detail the deadly force of the Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906.
The subsequent fire that engulfed the city left more than 3,000 dead and thousands more injured. Images of the devastation left behind were captured by pioneering photographer Frederick Eugene Ives.
The never before seen snaps of the city's downtown area were taken from the roof of the Hotel Majestic, where Ives stayed on an October 1906 visit, and were unearthed by a volunteer at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History.
Unearthed: The rare snaps show the devastation near Union Square in the North East of the city, near San Francisco Bay
Thought to be the first colour photos from the devastating earthquake were taken by pioneer photographer Frederick Eugene Ives
Skyline: These images look South East from the Hotel Majestic roof, towards what appears to be the dome of City Hall on the horizon (centre right)
His shots show the devastation in the North East of the city, near San Francisco Bay. They were stowed amid other items donated by Ives' son, Herbert, and discovered in 2009 by volunteer Anthony Brooks while he was cataloguing the collection.
Hand-coloured photographs of the quake's destruction have surfaced before, but Ives' work is probably the only true colour documentary evidence, Shannon Perich, associate curator of the Smithsonian's photography history collection believes.
She said Ives was one of only a few photographers experimenting with colour photography in the early 20th century and that his San Francisco images were meant to be viewed through a 3D device he invented but which never became a commercial success.
Perich told the San Francisco Chronicle: ‘Can you imagine how shocking these were?’
The Hotel Majestic, Ives base for these photographs, was built in 1902 - four years before the earthquake struck - and still stands on Sutter Street today. It claims to be 'San Francisco's oldest continuously operating hotel'.
The history section of its website, relating to the time of the disaster, states: 'The terrible fires that ravaged the city were halted at Van Ness Avenue, two blocks from The Majestic.'
Previous images: The subsequent fires tore through the city leaving nearly two-thirds of the population homeless
The pictures are street-level shots of San Francisco's shattered downtown and rooftop views overlooking miles of ruins.
They depict buildings damaged by fire and broken by the shaking ground. Some of the buildings still exist.
The process he used to produce colour images, creating separate slides for each primary colour in the light spectrum, required a long exposure and therefore was not conducive to capturing people and objects in motion.
Ives is well-known for inventing the half-tone reproduction process still used to print photographs in newspapers.
The Great Earthquake measured 7.9 on the Richter Scale as was felt as far away as Orgeon, Los Angeles and Nevada.
Around 227,000 and 300,000 people were left homeless out of a population of about 410,000 and lead to refugee camps set up along the coast, which were still operational two years after the quake.
The cost of the damage from the earthquake was estimated at the time to be around $400million, which is around $9.5 billion in today’s money.
The quake caused around $9billion-worth of damage in today's money, and the extent of it can be seen in this shot of Union Square, with the Victory statue in the distance
Vibrant: Downtown San Francisco before the 1906 earthquake
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-century-later-Smithsonian.html#ixzz1GCEbTJIR
