Today is International Women’s Day, a day that has been recognized since the early 1900s. The theme for this year is “Be Bold for Change.” In the United States, today is also being observed as “A Day Without a Woman.”
A View to Hugh would like to participate in the celebration by asking you to help change some things in the online collection of Hugh Morton photographs: reduce the number of photographs that have in their descriptions the phrase “unidentified woman” or “unidentified women.” The combined total currently stands forty-six images. Wouldn’t it be great if we could reach the ultimate goal of “a day without unidentified women?”
Here’s how you can participate. Click on either of the following linked phrases: “unidentified woman” or “unidentified women.” Each will take you into the online image collection via a pre-determined search. You can then browse through the images looking for anyone you can identify.
If you recognize someone you have two options: add the information to the comment section at the bottom of that webpage, or preferably, add the information as a comment to this blog post so we can see what progress we are making. Commenting here is a great option if you aren’t sure about a possible identification. Just say who you think it might be and we can have a conversation about it.
You’ll want to have either two windows or two tabs open in your Web browser. Before you comment here at A View to Hugh, go to the image’s webpage and click the phrase “Reference URL”—a unique Web address used only for that image’s record—and copy the web address provided in the top box. See the sample below:
Next, come back to this webpage and leave a comment below AND paste the Reference URL into the comment so we know the image you are identifying.
Please note that your comment may not show up immediately. Because of the enormous amount of comment spam we receive, I need to approve comments, especially those commenting for the first time or for comments with multiple links.
And most important of all . . . have fun!
http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/morton_highlights/id/733
I believe the unidentified woman in this picture is Nancy Lee Yelverton from Rocky Mount, Miss North Carolina 1950. She was selected Miss North Carolina in the summer of 1949 at Wrightsville Beach…likely where this picture was taken.
Thanks, Jack! She does look like the same person as pictured on the Miss North Carolina Pageant Contest history webpage: http://www.missnc.org/about/our-history. I wonder about this Morton photograph of Ms. Yelverton, though: http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/morton_highlights/id/2357. Looks like a different smile?
http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/morton_highlights/id/2020
http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/morton_highlights/id/1985
Stephen, I don’t have an identification for these two women, but if I may, I’ll offer a possible source for ID information…it’s Hugh Morton’s 1971 booklet, “Hugh Morton’s Democratic Photo Album.”
http://search.lib.unc.edu/search?R=UNCb6835683
Jack: neither are in that booklet, but there are scenes from that event that are pictured in there. There is a photograph of a different event, however, that depicts Sam J. Ervin Jr with National Democratic Party Committeewoman Mary Laurens Richardson. She bears some resemblance to the woman in http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/morton_highlights/id/2020. Any thoughts on that possibility?
http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/morton_highlights/id/2020
I don’t have a copy of Morton’s ’71 booklet, but I’ll check out the photo you mention the next time I visit the library.
http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/morton_highlights/id/2300
I sent this link to Susan Taylor Block. I’m sure you will recall, she is a Wilmington author and historian. I asked her about an identification of the woman on the left. Here is Susan’s reply:
Hi Jack,
She is Miss Lael Jackson, and she held the title of Miss National Airlines. [Wilmington Morning Star, March 29, 1958. Microfilm Collection, North Carolina Room, New Hanover County Public Library]
Glad to help!
Susan
As often happens, I believe I identified a photograph while working on a different project. The woman in http://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/morton_highlights/id/733 is likely Blye Swanson of Statesville. I found a negative of a woman with “Miss Statesville” on her sash in the 1948 Miss North Carolina pageant negatives. The gap in her teeth looks like her smile in the beach photograph. Then in the Statesville Daily Record on page 9 for 20 July 1948, this is the tidbit:
“On Sunday the boys with cameras got all the girls on the beach for a picture-taking session, and so many of them wanted to take Blye Swanson’s picture they eventually had to put their names in a hat. After one photographer had used up his allotted time, she’d pull another name from the hat.”
“Hugh Morton got one of Football Star Charlie Justice carrying Blye out of the ocean on his back. That one we’re trying to get to officially open the football season.”
The negative in question shows Justice and Orville Campbell carrying the woman, but perhaps this one was made during the same shooting session. If so, that’s Blye Swanson.