Historic City Views | MONOVISIONS - Black & White Photography Magazine

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Danzig (Gdańsk), West Prussia, Germany (1890s)

6 February 2023 0

Polish westerly Royal Prussia was annexed by the easterly Kingdom of Prussia during the late 18th century Partitions of Poland, with the city of Danzig becoming part of the Prussian Kingdom in 1793. The territory was administered in the new…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of County Donegal, Ireland (1890s)

24 January 2023 0

The modern County Donegal was shired by order of the English Crown in 1585. The English authorities at Dublin Castle formed the new county by amalgamating the old Kingdom of Tír Chonaill with the old Lordship of Inishowen. However, although…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of St. Gotthard Railway, Switzerland (1890s)

10 January 2023 0

By the early years of the 1870s, northern Switzerland had a significant network of railways, with links to the adjoining railways of Germany and France. To the west, a line had reached Brig, in the upper Rhone valley, from Lausanne.…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Wernigerode, Germany (1890s)

2 January 2023 0

Wernigerode was the capital of the medieval County of Wernigerode and Stolberg-Wernigerode. In 1815, after the Napoleonic Wars, it became part of the Prussian Province of Saxony. The Hasseröder brewery was founded in Wernigerode in 1872. After World War II,…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Pomerania, Germany (1890s)

21 December 2022 0

Prussia gained the southern parts of Swedish Pomerania in 1720, invaded and annexed Pomerelia from Poland in 1772 and 1793, and gained the remainder of Swedish Pomerania in 1815, after the Napoleonic Wars. The former Brandenburg-Prussian Pomerania and the former…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Towns in Bavaria, Germany (1890s)

13 December 2022 0

When Bavaria became part of the newly formed German Empire, this action was considered controversial by Bavarian nationalists who had wanted to retain independence from the rest of Germany, as had Austria. As Bavaria had a heavily Catholic majority population,…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Harz, Germany (1890s)

17 November 2022 0

Around 1800, large swathes of the Harz were deforested. The less resistant spruce monoculture, that arose as a consequence of the mining industry in the Upper Harz, was largely destroyed by a bark beetle outbreak and a storm of hurricane…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Blackpool, England (1890s)

12 November 2022 0

The most significant event in the early growth of the town occurred in 1846, with the completion of a branch line to Blackpool from Poulton on the main Preston and Wyre Joint Railway line from Preston to Fleetwood. Fleetwood declined…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Bavaria, Germany (1890s)

9 October 2022 0

Since 1803, the town has been a part of Bavaria. The famous German landscape painter Eugen Bracht visited Rothenburg in 1877; although he stayed only two days, he was clearly impressed. Some years later, especially artists of Romanticism, such as…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Colberg (Kołobrzeg), Pomerania, Germany (1890s)

25 September 2022 0

In the early 19th century, the town’s medieval fortifications were demolished and replaced by parks. The duke also started the collection of copperplate engravings that is today part of the Veste Coburg museum. Under his son, Ernest, the Schlossplatz with…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Thuringia, Germany (1890s)

18 September 2022 0

The modern German black-red-gold tricolour flag’s first appearance anywhere in a German-ethnicity sovereign state, within what today comprises Germany, occurred in 1778 as the state flag of the Principality of Reuss-Greiz, a defunct principality in the modern state’s borders. Some…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of County Cork, Ireland (1890s)

6 September 2022 0

In the early 17th century, the townland of Leamcon (near Schull) was a pirate stronghold, and pirates traded easily in Baltimore and Whiddy Island. In the 19th century, Cork was a centre for the Fenians and for the constitutional nationalism…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of County Kerry, Ireland (1890s)

2 August 2022 0

In the 17th and 18th centuries Kerry became increasingly populated by poor tenant farmers, who came to rely on the potato as their main food source. As a result, when the potato crop failed in 1845, Kerry was very hard…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Konigsberg, East Prussia (Kaliningrad, Russia) 1890s

25 July 2022 0

After the First Partition of Poland in 1772, Königsberg became the capital of the newly formed province of East Prussia in 1773, which replaced the Province of Prussia in 1773. By 1800 the city was approximately five miles (8.0 km)…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Helgoland, Germany (1890s)

4 July 2022 0

In 1826, Heligoland became a seaside spa and soon turned into a popular tourist resort for the European upper class. The island attracted artists and writers, especially from Germany and Austria who apparently enjoyed the comparatively liberal atmosphere, including Heinrich…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Tessin, Switzerland (1890s)

25 June 2022 0

In the early 19th century, the contemporary Franco-Danish scholar Conrad Malte-Brun stated that: “The canton of Tesino [Ticino] is the poorest, and the people the most ignorant of any in Switzerland. The finest silk in the district is obtained at…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany (1890s)

14 June 2022 0

Contrary to the hopes of German Schleswig-Holsteiners, the area did not gain its independence, but was annexed as a province of Prussia in 1867. Also following the Austro-Prussian War in 1866, section five of the Peace of Prague stipulated that…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Towns in Scotland (1890s)

3 June 2022 0

Industrialisation, urbanisation and the Disruption of 1843 all undermined the tradition of parish schools. From 1830 the state began to fund buildings with grants; then from 1846 it was funding schools by direct sponsorship; and in 1872 Scotland moved to…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Anhalt, Germany (1890s)

22 May 2022 0

After the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, the remaining Anhalt divisions – Bernburg, Dessau and Köthen – were elevated to duchies by Napoleon while the Electorate of Saxony became a Kingdom; all were part of Napoleon’s Confederation…

Vintage: Historic B&W photos of Lubeck, Germany (1890s)

10 May 2022 0

Humans settled in the area around what today is Lübeck after the last Ice Age ended about 9700 BCE. Lübeck is famous for having been the cradle and the de facto capital of the Hanseatic League. Its city centre is…

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