A. M. Hopewell Collection

I first learnt about these photographs, taken by my great grandmother Alice, in the early 1980s when my father decided it would be a good idea for them to be preserved and took the collection of glass plates to the State Library of South Australia.  He recalled playing with them as a child when he lived with his grandparents. 

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The library took prints from selected plates and then returned them and a printed copy to the family.  Unfortunately some of the plates had been labelled using sticking plaster in the bottom left corner.  This was not able to be removed as you will see if viewing the SLSA collection.  The upside is that at least the locations these plates depict had been identified by Alice. 

 

The magic of photo editing software has enabled me to "repair" the sticking plaster patch on most of the photo's shown here, although a small number were beyond my capabilities. 

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In 1983 my grandmother, Alice's daughter Phyl, attended the Marree Centenery Celebrations organised by Lois Litchfield.  She took the prints provided by SLSA with her and attempted to get them identified by some of the other attendees.  Herb Tilmouth, a former Marree resident, was quite informative and I have included his comments in the descriptions.

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Some of the photo's were also used in the exhibition "South Australian Women Photographers" put on at the Festival Centre as part of the Bicentennial Celebrations of 1988.  These can also be viewed on the SLSA website.

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Shortly after this Phyl decided the photo's would make a great coffee table book and set about arranging them into some sort of logical order and adding text to describe the locations and people depicted.  This was never published.

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Finally in 2017 the album created by Phyl has come to me.   After sharing a few of the photos with the Farina Restoration Group I though it would be wonderful if the entire collection could be viewed in one place and so have created this website.  Where possible,  I have further researched the locations and occasions depicted in the photos.  Some additional photo's from early family albums which were not taken by Alice but are still of interest have also been included.

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The photo's here are free to use but not to sell.  The family would appreciate acknowledgement of the photographer, Alice Mary Hopewell (or A M Hopewell Collection) when such use takes place.  This will not only keep me happy, it will also help those who would like to see the entire collection.  Images here are shown at 90% resolution.  Full resolution images of many of the photographs can be obtained from the State Library of South Australia or otherwise by contacting me, per the contact page.

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Alice's family hope you enjoy seeing her view of early 20th Century Outback South Australia.