The work of Louis Pesha featured at Black Gold Fest
Article content
Born in Lambton County just one year after Confederation, Louis Pesha earned a reputation as a prolific and talented postcard photographer in the four years before he died in a fatal steam car accident.
The life of Pesha, and examples of his work, will be featured during the Oil Museum of Canada's Black Gold Fest, July 21, at Oil Springs.
A history of Pesha's life and career, written by Chatham-Kent historian Jim Gilbert, says the photographer was born in 1868 just north of the small community of Shetland, in what was then Euphemia Township.
He married Lena Faucher in 1892 and they farmed near Shetland until Pesha was 27 and began a new career as a photographer who eventually had studios in Alvinston, Brigden, Inwood and Oil Springs.
Pesha later crossed the St. Clair River to Michigan and opened a studio in Marine City in 1901 where he later began producing postcards of images taken on trips across the Great Lakes region.
"Among those who collect postcards from the southeastern third of Michigan, Pesha is extremely well known," said Doug Aikenhead, a photography educator and postcard dealer in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
"He was certainly more prolific than any other postcard photographer working in this area."
He was successful enough that by 1910 Pesha was able to buy a $4,000 steam car from the White Company of Cleveland.
It was the car he was driving in October 1912 when Pesha, then just 44, was killed while visiting the Shetland area. The steam car, it's said, overturned in a ditch. Pesha was buried in the family plot in Shetland, according to Gilbert.
While most known for his postcards of ships on the St. Clair River, they don't make up the majority of the images Pesha produced, according to Aikenhead.
"He made far more views of everything from major cities, to small towns in southeastern Michigan, northern Ohio, Niagara Falls, the Buffalo area, along the south shores of Lake Erie and southwestern Ontario."
Aikenhead estimated ships were the subjects of perhaps just 1,500 of the postcards Pesha produced, compared to a "ballpark" estimate of 7,000 photographs of scenes in cities and towns.
He said Pesha's postcards are collectable today, but some are more sought after than others.
"To my mind, what is most spectacular about Pesha is that he didn't really start making postcard photographs until about 1906," Aikenhead said.
"Even then, it was pretty tentative."
Pesha started out photographing buildings in Marine City, and eventually street scenes, along with portrait work.
It wasn't until 1908 that Pesha made a commitment to becoming a postcard photographer, producing the lion's share of his work between that year and his death in 1912, Aikenhead said.
One of the biggest mysteries about Pesha, and most other early postcard photographers, is how they learned their craft, Aikenhead said.
"We assume that Pesha must have apprenticed with somebody around the Lambton County area, but we don't know for sure."
While he started out competing with other small town photographers taking portraits, Pesha wasn't known as a talented portrait photographer.
But, once Pesha made the conversion to being a postcard photographer, the progress in his skills increased dramatically year-by-year.
"By 1909, 1910 he's doing postcard images that are as well-made as anybody else in the country," Aikenhead said.
"And, some of his images are utterly spectacular."
The Black Gold Fest will include a short historical skit about Pesha, written by Carol Graham of Petrolia, that will be performed at 1:15 p.m. and 2:15 p.m., as well as a display of historical photography equipment from the collection of Hugh Clouse.
The museum will also offer guided horse-drawn wagon tours of the oil fields at 1:30 p.m. and 2:30 p.m., as well as other historical displays and activities, live music, refreshments and homemade pie.
Black Gold Fest runs from noon to 4 p.m., at the museum, and admission is $6 adults, $5 seniors and students, $4 children and $18 for a family.