Any guesses on the age of this NYC photo?

This is a photo of the McGraw Hill building in New York City. It's about 14" x 10". The reason I'm asking, is that eBay photo categories are Contemporary (1940-now) and Vintage and Antique (before 1940).

The building was built in 1931 and is on 42nd Street, between 8th and 9th Avenues. Since that's the west side of Manhattan and there's a body of water in the photo, I think the view is towards the west, showing a bit of the Hudson River.

I was thinking that the fact there are no other tall buildings could help date the photo, but the west side wasn't build up much for a long time so I'm not sure how big a help it is.

When the building was new its Art Deco styling was highly regarded, so maybe the photo was taken in the early '30s when it was considered something new and fresh?

Thoughts?

 

Did you forget something, Pat?

 

Hmmmm. I'm having a hard time seeing your photo.

 

Oops! LOL!

Will insert it in the first post forthwith!

 

I'd go with before 1940. The logic you mentioned about new and fresh makes a whole lot of sense.

 

Thanks, Bakers. I was especially thinking this since it's a very large photo... like it might have been used for promotional purposes.

 

Love it. It looks before 1940 to me as well.
Maybe you can find 1930-1940 photos of the general area and see what the changes in the period were.

 

Is it trimmed along the edges, or did you crop the scan?

I think it would be safe to put it in the before 1940 category.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/330_West_42nd_Street

 

Yep, Hudson, with NJ visible on the other side. Camera is looking sort of (correction) west northwest.

 

That your reasoning is sound.
Wondering if this is the church visible in the lower right corner:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Cross_Church_(Manhattan)

 

One consideration on the date would be that it is in black and white. One of the attributes of the building according to Bronwen's link is that it is green, which would be important for a photograph. Is there any applied color on it anywhere? It is glossy or matte?

 

That's not a b&w photo. It appears to be a duotone. But I'd be curious... What does the full photograph look like without cropping? Size? What type of stock is it printed on -- matte or glossy? Anything written on the back?

Debora

 

Is there any notation of the photographer or studio that took the photo? As (relatively) modern photos are not unique items, there is a chance you could track down another print that might be associated with a date.

 

It was already trimmed, unfortunately.

 

I google mapped the building last night on 42nd Street, and there are still low, very old buildings across the street from McGraw Hill. If I remember correctly, one building did look like the church in the photo. I'll try to identify the name of the church and add it to my listing.

Thanks for pointing that out!

 

It's black and white, and no applied color. It has a gloss finish.

 

I'm not familar with duotones, but this is a photograph with a glossy finish. It's not a halftone repro. It's large, 10" x 14" and there's nothing written on the back. It has a bit of foxing on the back clearly showing it's age.

 

That doesn't appear to be a b&w photograph on my monitor. Think you should read this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duotone

Also IMO there's a bit of overthinking here. You've a vintage photograph of a 1931 International-style building. Logic would place it in the pre-1940s category. If you're off by a few years, will it really make a difference? I would think what was more important than dating photo is identifying the photographer. That's something that would add value.

Debora

 

Good idea! I forget if I ran this through Google images' image search tool... will do that later.

Unfortunately, there aren't any notations at all. It was among my mother's things, which means I've had it since 2000, but other than that I don't know the provenance.