Brandywine Valley oral history interviewees' photographs

About this collection

    The Oral histories on work and daily life in the Brandywine Valley (Accession 1970.370) collection contains oral history interviews conducted by Hagley staff between 1954 and 1990 with individuals who had worked at the DuPont Company powder yards on Brandywine Creek during the yards’ final decades of operation, or who had lived near the yards as spouses or children of DuPont Company workers. Click here to visit the digital collection for these recordings and transcripts.
    Some of the interviewees donated, lent for copying, or provided information about photographs depicting the workers' communities and powder yards. These photographs now form the Brandywine Valley oral history interviewees' photographs (Accession 2017.255) collection.
    Image: DuPont Co. workers enjoying a drink near the Club House at Thompson's Bridge. Click to view.

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Wreck of the Major Reybold
Description from donor: "Tied up at Pusey and Jones wharf, looking upstream. Note old Market St. Bridge in background and old Warner Co. buildings on south side of Christina River."
Wreck of S.M. Felton
Name of boat on board, right side of upper deck rail.
Hagley workmen in saloon, possibly Robinson's saloon in Wilmington, Delaware
Left to right: Walker Mathewson, bartender Bill Hearn, Jeff Blakeley, and Les Robinson.
Gasoline traction engine designed by Alfred I. du Pont
Left to right identified by Bader: "Mike Maloney, Ed Bader at controls, 'Expert' from New York, William Houston (foreman of the machine shop)."
Coal car in Hagley Yard
Race-way track and new dam at lower end Hagley Yard, showing coal tar and upper race waste-way to the left.
Horse-drawn gunpowder wagon Deadwood, South Dakota
Man at left, on horseback, identified as Arthur Simpson (brother of W.S. Simpson, DuPont employee). Man at right with gun cradled in arms is identified as Robert Divinnell.
Powder workmen's farewell at Nemours, home of Alfred I. du Pont
The following people are identified: Ed Bader, machinist; Frank Haley, clerk; Tom Tulley, clerk; John Dougherty, clerk; Will Beatty, pattern maker; Seitz, foreman of woodwork shop; Bob Millin, tinsmith.
Powdermen's Outing
Front Row: Man with crutch - Pierre Gentieu, Next to him - Alfred I. du Pont (on Gentieu's left), Man kneeling on front row in straw hat - Mike Maloney (blacksmith). Last row, fourteenth from right, lower deck: Mr. Hoover (standing).
Maxwell family
Seated are Joseph Maxwell (1833-1911) and Mary Ellen Warrick Maxwell (1838?-1912). The young women standing behind them are presumably the Maxwells' granddaughters, Mary Esther Campbell and Martha Ellen Campbell.
Members of the Meadowbrook Club Fife & Drum Corps and other young men from Henry Clay, Delaware
Left to right: Harry Deer, Daniel Walsh, Thomas Jackson, Clifford Blakely, Joseph Sheppard, Edward Beacom, Garrett Miller, Joseph Williams, Raymond Johnson, Edward Cheney, Joseph Consono, Lee Knox, and Arthur Jackson. Donor identifies location as "on the stone wall...between the House and the sand pile."
Meadowbrook Fife and Drum Corps
Back row: Joseph Williams, Cornelius Dougherty, Daniel Walsh, Edward Beacom, John Russel (Leader of Corps), Edward Cheney, Thomas Jackson, Edward Williams, and Joseph Sheppard. Front row: Edward Andrews, John McElhinney, John Gamble, George Russel (Mascot), and George Buchanan.
Meadowbrook Fife and Drum Corps
Back row: Joseph Williams, Cornelius Dougherty, Daniel Walsh, Edward Beacom, John Russel (Leader of Corps), Edward Cheney, Thomas Jackson, Edward Williams, and Joseph Sheppard. Front row: Edward Andrews, George Russel (Mascot), John McElhinney, John Gamble, and George Buchanan.
Alfred I. du Pont farewell party
The following people are identified on a tracing paper overlay: Alfred I. du Pont, Ernest du Pont, two unnamed drivers, Lynch (plumber), Joe Haley, John Andrews who "ran off with barn burning detectives who were pretending to be religious group," Mike Mahony's dad, Thomas Knox (Bader's brother-in-law burned in explosion of 1898), "old foreman," Dorman who "worked in packing house," Albert "Yabba" Buchanan who "ran ? plant with trains," and the Rowe brothers (cooper and painter). See tracing paper overlay for locations in photograph.

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