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Searching forFlorence Benjamin Filene Often we are confronted by history unexpectedly—captivated by an item in an antique shop or surprised by a forgotten store of family letters in a relative’s attic.For Benjamin Filene,an exhibit curator at the Minnesota Historical Society,it was the eyes of a little girl,identified only as Florence Blood,photographed at her piano on February 25,1912.Florence’s photograph was one of hundreds Filene pored overwhile preparing the Minnesota music exhibit,Sounds Good to Me,but her eyes haunted him. He embarked on a minor odyssey of discovery,searching not only for the girl in the photo,but also for some tangible connection between our time and the living past. For me,it was the eyes.With her hand resting easily on the piano,the girl gives the camera a piercing look of pride and self-possession,with just a hint of de- fiance.That look stirred up deep feelings in me—about music,about daughters (especially prideful,self-possessed,occasionally defiant daughters),about reaching back for the past. I admit—and it became even more plain later, when I knew more—that I brought personal feelings to bear on the image. But this wasn’t a time to be an “objective historian.”This was a time to indulge, for a moment,the warm,vaguely melancholy feeling that comes from connecting to the past and to rememberwhy I became a historian in the first place.And it was time to learn more. All that was written on the back of the photograph was “Florence Blood seated at piano,Feb.25,1912,” plus the call number assigned by the Minnesota Historical Society’s library.The photo was one of hundreds that a team of us flipped through on an early winter afternoon in 1998;it is printed on page 411 of this book.The group was assigned to develop a new exhibit for the Society, Sounds Good to Me: Music in Minnesota. Two years before the opening date,we were starting to work in earnest. Until that point,“Sounds Good to Me” had been more a felicitous phrase than a meaningful title.Seeing Florence,though, brought it into focus for me.The exhibit should be about the feelings this girl had for music and the feelings I was having about the girl. It should be about 454 howwe all—in diJerent ways,in diJerent times,and in diJerent places—weave music into our lives:sounds good to me. Without telling the rest of the team,I order a print of the photograph,slide it into a frame,and put it on my piano at home.For several months,it sits there largely unexamined.Occasionally my four-year-old daughter,Eliza,notices it and asks if it is a picture of her.“No,” I say,“it’s someone who lived a long,long time ago.”“You mean before I was born?”“Yes,before you were born.” Is that all? Can the photograph become more than just a reservoir for the vaguely nostalgic feelings I’d imposed on it? Can Florence be found? One day,I begin the hunt. The most obvious route dead-ends. Most objects in MHS’s collections have donor files that tell how they came to the Society. But our photography curator , Bonnie Wilson, turns up no file on this image, just a record showing that the actual donation had been a 4⬙ⴛ5⬙ glass-plate negative, not a print. In the 1950s and ’60s, shortly after the Society established its audio-visual library, it was not uncommon for people to donate a stack of glass negatives.The understaJed department might not have time to develop the images for a while,and donor records eitherwere not created or did not itemize all of the images.The surprisingly precise name and date on Florence’s photo likely were handwritten on the paperwrapperthat held the negative when itwas dropped oJ.Bonnie speculates that since the identification includes Florence’s last name,the photograph was probably snapped by someone other than a family member (who would have written just“Florence”)—perhaps an itinerant photographer or an amateur who owned a camera and took pictures for everyone on the block. Regardless of the exact scenario,I can’t call Florence’s descendants and say, “Tell me about your grandmother.” I turn back to the photo itself.Again I am struck by the clarity of the image.You can tell Florence dressed...

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