Overview
Includes black-and-white portrait photographs of film actors from the 1920s by Russell Ball.
Dates
- Creation: circa 1920-1930
Language of Materials
Collection is in English.
Conditions Governing Access
There are no restrictions on physical access to this material. Collection is open for research.
Extent
.33 linear feetIncludes black-and-white photographs of film actors, both portraits (including some with their families and pets) and film stills, by Russell Ball in the 1920s, when he was working in Los Angeles, California, and working as a freelance photographer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and other film production companies. Some of the images were created as film stills and include Gloria Swanson in “Zaza,” Tom Meighan in “The Alaskan,” and Rudolph Valentino in “The Son of the Sheik.”
Biographical / Historical
Russell Earp Ball was born 1891 March 24 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Ball began his career as a photographer working for newspapers, and then became a commercial photographer. In the 1920s, Ball relocated to Los Angeles, California, with his wife, Gladys Hall, and focused his photographic work in the film industry, including portraits of actors and their families and photographic stills for film production companies. In 1923, he photographed Gloria Swanson to promote the film “Zaza,” and took photographs early in the 1920s of actor Rudolph Valentino and his first wife, Jean Acker. He began working for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1925, and it was during this period that he took many film stills and portraits of actors. He opened his own gallery in Beverly Hills in the late 1920s, where he continued to create portraits of celebrities and wealthy patrons. He died 1942 June 12.
Arrangement
Arranged in alphabetical order by the surname of the principal subject of the portrait. In group portraits, the first subject inscribed on the mat has been considered the principal subject.
Physical Location
pfd (P1.C1.02.14 [Folders 1-33])
Custodial History
Gift of John G. Heinz and Frank J. Heinz, 1973 December 12.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Gift of John G. Heinz and Frank J. Heinz, 1973 December 12.
Processing Information
Processed by Betts Coup, 2018 May.
- Title
- Ball, Russell. Russell Ball photographs, circa 1920-1930 (MS Thr 1792): Guide.
- Status
- in_progress
- Author
- Houghton Library, Harvard University.
- Date
- 2018 May 01
- Description rules
- dacs
- Language of description
- und
- EAD ID
- hou02924
Repository Details
Part of the Houghton Library Repository
Houghton Library is Harvard College's principal repository for rare books and manuscripts, archives, and more. Houghton Library's collections represent the scope of human experience from ancient Egypt to twenty-first century Cambridge. With strengths primarily in North American and European history, literature, and culture, collections range in media from printed books and handwritten manuscripts to maps, drawings and paintings, prints, posters, photographs, film and audio recordings, and digital media, as well as costumes, theater props, and a wide range of other objects. Houghton Library has historically focused on collecting the written record of European and Eurocentric North American culture, yet it holds a large and diverse number of primary sources valuable for research on the languages, culture and history of indigenous peoples of the Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania.
Houghton Library’s Reading Room is free and open to all who wish to use the library’s collections.
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