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A Life on Polaroid
By
Jen Carlson
Published May 27, 2008
Modified May 28, 2008
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By
Jen Carlson
Published May 27, 2008
Modified May 28, 2008
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Last week the website Mental Floss discovered a treasure chest of old Polaroids online, all chronologically ordered and taken throughout the years 1979 to 1997. Soon after the discovery, Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn provided the full story behind what seemed like a very mysterious website.
The site was in the process of being created by Hugh Crawford and Betsy Reid, who were in possession of over 6000 Polaroids taken by their late friend Jamie Livingston. Mental Floss has a good, albeit sad, rundown of Livingston's life, which is now documented (up to the day he died) through the images online. OTBKB also noted that 10 years after Livingston’s death, a public exhibit of the 6,697 Polaroids, dated in sequence, went up at Bard College (where Livingston started the series).
The site holding all of the photographs, after five days of crashing from all the unexpected traffic, seems to be back up and running, visit it here -- it's a bit more romantic than Flickr.
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Jen Carlson
Jen Carlson is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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