Photographs: Slides & Transparencies Collection, late 19th century - 2000s | Oberlin College Archives

This category of photographic materials comprises transparent positives.  They are arranged in four series:  Series 1. Lantern Slides; Series 2. Mounted Film Transparencies; Series 3. Unmounted Film Transparencies; and Series 4. Slide Sets.  This collection was created for those transparencies that are not part of an institutional record group or a personal paper group.

The mounted transparencies, also known as slides, were used with a projector for teaching and presentations, beginning with glass lantern slides in the early 20^th century.  These are two plates of glass, held together with black tape; one of the plates holds the black and white image on emulsion.  These were sometimes hand-tinted.  As early as 1917, Clarence Ward, Director of the Allen Memorial Art Museum and Professor of Art, brought to Oberlin several projection machines for glass lantern slides that were fitted with a revolving mechanism for inserting and removing slides automatically, triggered by a remote control installed in the lecture hall.  Before this, slide projectors required the operator to insert and remove each slide one at a time by hand.  One of Ward’s slide projectors is held by Archives; the other extant machines are still in the projection booths in the art department’s lecture halls and are occasionally used to project lantern slides.  This collection’s lantern slides date from roughly the 1910s and possibly earlier to the 19??.

Lantern slides fell out of use with the development of projectors for mounted 35 mm color or black and white film transparencies in the 1960s.  These slides have mounts made of cardboard or plastic, and were used with the Kodak carousel slide projector patented in 1965.  This projector has a remote control so that the presenter could advance the slides from a short distance.  For half a century professors relied on carousel projectors In the lecture hall, operated by a technician in the booth, until digital technology gained ascendancy in the 2000s.  This collection’s mounted slides date from the 1950s to the 2000s.

Unmounted film transparencies are generally high quality, 4” x 5” color transparencies, generated primarily for publications, produced in the late 20^th century until digital photography became common. This collection covers 1988-2001 with the bulk covering 2000-2001.  Of particular interest are the professional color transparencies of campus buildings.

Series 1. Lantern Slides, late 19^th century to mid-20^th century (7.59 linear feet)

The Lantern Slides series, as of March 2017, comprised twenty-one boxes containing slides with subject matter dating from ca. 1833 to the mid-20^th century.  An additional box holds records kept by the technician or campus photographer responsible for creating or assembling the slides and maintaining a log of slide numbers with descriptions.  These records, which include index cards and a notebook, are incomplete.

Lantern slides originated as components of 17^th century “magic lanterns.”  The earliest slides were hand-painted glass; after the popularization of photography, lantern slide quality dramatically improved and they became popular for use in education.  Early commercial lantern slides were printed as black-and-white positive images, though photographers often made “reduction” prints (made by photographing the photo directly onto the glass slide with a camera).  Lantern slide makers usually attached a paper border to the slide, covered the slide with protective glass, and finalized the slide with a taped edge. Occasionally, colorists would pigment the glass to color the lantern slide. Lantern slide popularity reached its zenith in the early 20^th century; color 35mm film transparencies replaced glass lantern slides in the mid-20^th century.

The lantern slides in this group predominantly display Oberlin College portraits, student life, and buildings. Additional subjects include: street plans and buildings of the city of Oberlin; the history of Massachusetts; Yellowstone National Park; World War I; Tuscany; and a 1923 style show at Oberlin College, with models in historical dresses.  The slides of Yellowstone were likely acquired by or for Lynds Jones, Professor of Animal Ecology at Oberlin, who led student research field trips throughout the western United States from 1915 through the 1930s.

More detailed lists of the slides in each box are available in the collection case file.

Series 2. Mounted film transparencies, 1950s-2000s (5.20 linear feet)

These images, generated primarily for presentations, cover the 1950s to early 2000s with the bulk covering the mid-1980s to early 1990s.  Like the photographic print collection, they are arranged into three general categories: Graduates, Faculty, Staff, Others, & Presidents; Buildings; and Subjects.  A small number of mounted stereoview film slides were taken at the 1953 Commencement by Norman “Skip” Sperber, brother of Michael Sperber, OC 1953.  Most of these are mounted between glass.

Series 3. Unmounted film transparencies, 1988-2001 (0.4 linear feet)

This small grouping is held in one box, arranged into the three categories listed above for mounted film transparencies.  The largest number depict campus buildings.

Series 4. Slide Sets, 1979 (1 folder)

Contains one set of 96 mounted, 35mm slides produced by the Alumni Association, entitled “This is Oberlin.”  The slides are dated 1979.  Some slides in the numerical sequence are missing.