RAILWAY PRIDE

Family photo. Railroad of the West. National Territory of La Pampa. 1909.

Vintage photography. Silver gelatin print toned in sepia. Image measures: 12 x 17.3 cm. Measurement of the secondary support; white cardstock, embossed: 20.5 x 25.4 cm. Advertising wet stamp printed below and to the right of the support: "Eloy Salgado / de la casa / P. Bauer y Cía. / 132 - Piedras- 154 / Buenos Aires". Handwritten signature in black iron gall ink: "Eloy Salgado. 1909".

In 1909, Dr. José Figueroa Alcorta governed the destinies of the Argentines. The country was undergoing economic transformations of magnitude with the discovery of oil in Comodoro Rivadavia (1907), the replacement of frozen sheep meat by chilled beef exports, the strong increase in grain exports to Europe and the landing of US capital.

After the so-called Conquest of the Desert (begun in 1879), the expansion of the national territory towards the south of Patagonia was consolidated and, in this civilizing strategy, the railway lines promoted the creation of new towns, being vital axes of economic development.

The present image rescued from oblivion shows us a family of those settlers; the five adults and four children pose proudly on the platform of a brand new station. With good judgment, the photographer located a family group against the background of said construction; it is a record of summer that allows us to appreciate the feminine fashion of the time and the life of those pioneer settlers. One of them, a young man - around 30 years old - with a conspicuous handlebar mustache, proudly displays his vest watch.

About the photographer Eloy Salgado we will say that he was at the service of the import and export firm P. Bauer y Cía. of Buenos Aires, an important German firm specializing in the provision of industrial supplies for the Argentine countryside. Some biographical references of this camera professional are known; around 1906 he was based in the Pampas town of Victorica as part of the Pro-Western Railway Commission, in 1909 he documented the visit to the country of the famous Valencian writer Vicente Blasco Ibañez (1867-1928) who would later publish the well-known book "Argentina and its greatness".

Salgado was also a graphic collaborator of the Argentine Social Museum -house of studies founded in May 1911- of Buenos Aires; Precisely in the Bulletin of the year 1912, Volume I°, the writing of the same appreciates the images sent by the "competent amateur photographer". We must point out that Eloy Salgado signed all the photographs of him on the lower edge of the same and with an elegant calligraphy.

Abel Alexander

President of the Ibero-American Society for the History of Photography