Photograph Collections from the Library Company now on PhillyHistory.org

Philadelphia Library. On the northeast corner of Fifth and Library street. / Photograph by Richards

The Library Company has recently partnered with PhillyHistory.org, providing several photographic collections to its website. Run by the Philadelphia Department of Records, PhillyHistory.org includes photographs and maps from the Free Library of Philadelphia, the Philadelphia Department of Records, the Philadelphia Water Department, and the Philadelphia Office of the City Representative. The Library Company is honored to be the first non-government organization to join the consortium.

To enrich the primarily late-19th-century and 20th-century photograph collections previously found on the website, the Library Company has contributed three collections depicting views of mid-19th-century Philadelphia by the photographers James McClees, Frederick De Bourg Richards, and Montgomery P. Simons.

PhillyHistory.org is a unique website where users can search for photographs and maps by location, neighborhood, or keyword and also by maneuvering a map to see available images pinpointed by geographic location. Users can also purchase photographic reproductions through the website. By including these images on PhillyHistory.org, the Library Company hopes to introduce the photographs to new audiences and to make the images available via smart phone technology, another exciting feature of PhillyHistory.org.

This is just the beginning of the collaboration as the Library Company intends to upload more collections in the near future. As a result of our collaboration, one of our images was recently showcased on the University of the Arts Libraries News blog featuring PhillyHistory.org as the “Digital Library of the Week.”