Elephants!

Blog Post #3

In the opening statement of the blog, I mentioned talking points to follow and one of them was Elephants. So here it is!

What I failed to mention was that along with a picture of Elephants, I also found a picture of a team of White Horses and a picture of Camels. To some of my readers, you may be saying “I don’t understand. What is the big deal about pictures Davidson took of Elephants, Horses and Camels?”. And then there are those of us that remember the Nutting Auctions that so many of us went to for all those years. Any picture with an animal in it brought special attention. Sheep were commonplace but Horses and Cows were more rare and brought higher prices. And any signed photo from one of these artists with an Elephant or Camel in it would have been very special.

So what’s the story behind these pictures? With the onset of WWI, David Davidson, at the request of the governor of Rhode Island, was assigned the job of capturing war related activities throughout the state. The photos were all taken in black and white and they were mostly signed with a Davidson embossed signature.

David Davidsons camera captured troop training, battle simulations, and parades. But at some point in time, Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus must have paraded through the streets and Davidson was there to capture the event. In the photo of the white horses pulling a carriage, you can see a banner displaying the words “The Greatest Show on Earth”.

One of the great stories to come out of the half century of David Davidson Studios was the responsibility of capturing, in photos, Rhode Island’s involvement in WWI.

This is a story for another Day…