Sticky Backs and Photo Booth



 

Sticky-3 ladiesIt is the early 20th century and in England a fellow named Spiro Grossi, from Brighton, England, was a young man in his 20s whose occupation was that of a ‘Photographic Printer’ in Liverpool. He then moved to Manchester, where Grossi operated two photographic studios, one at 5 Marsden Square, the other at 84 Market Street.

He developed the idea individuals coming into his studio or just a candid photo, sort as we think of a selfie or the vintage photo booths found in malls. There were 6 photos taken of an individual, candid and placed on photo paper using any sticky material. sticky-boyEach photo measured 2 inches by 1 ½ inches. He referred to these quick images as ‘sticky backs’. With his new style of photos in 1910, he had a studio set up at Spiridione Grossi’s StickyBack and Post Cart Studio at 54 North Street, Brighton, England. More about his life is on the web site, ‘Sticky Backs‘.  sticky-2 ladies-hats

It was Anatol Josepho who took Grossi’s concept, came to America in the early 1920s and developed in the United States the phone booth, which he named “Photomaton”. It started in New York City in 1925 and the cost was 25 cents for a strips of 8 instant photos which took 8 minutes for the photo booth handler to process. It was so popular that Josepho was able to sell this new concept for one million dollars by 1927. Photo booths remained popular for decades. Have you ever located some photo booth images of your relatives and ancestors from decades ago? sticky-fellow

Photos: From Brighton, England – Sticky Back Images: Three ladies together, a boy, two ladies with hats and a fellow.

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