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University of Michigan William L. Clements Library

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Bonynge family photograph collection, ca. 1899-1939

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Summary

Creator:
Bonynge, Henry Arthur, 1883-1956
Abstract:
The Bonynge family photograph collection consists of ten photograph albums and approximately 600 loose photographs pertaining to the Bonynge family of New Jersey. The albums center on Henry Arthur Bonynge Jr., M.D., his wife Elizabeth and daughter Marjorie. Images include snapshots of family life in the northeastern United States, trips to Wyoming, El Salvador, Bermuda, Cuba, and Europe.
Extent:
10 volumes and 2 boxes of loose photographs
Language:
English
Authors:
Collection processed and finding aid created by Claire Milldrum and Louis Miller, January 2018

Background

Scope and Content:

The Bonynge family photograph collection consists of ten photograph albums and approximately 600 loose photographs pertaining to the Bonynge family of New Jersey. The albums center on Henry Arthur Bonynge Jr., M.D., his wife Elizabeth and daughter Marjorie. Images include snapshots of family life in northeastern United States, trips to Wyoming, El Salvador, Bermuda, Cuba, and Europe. The albums are roughly arranged in chronological order while the loose photographs are organized by location.

Volume One: The Bonynge family Hoboken album (27.25 x 36.25 cm, lacks covers) contains approximately 90 snapshots of Henry Bonynge Jr.'s family when he was a young man. A majority of these images are dated from 1898-1901 and were taken at 931 Washington Street in Hoboken. Images of note include domestic interior views, a Christmas tree, charming casual portraits, street snapshots, photographs of Henry Bonynge Sr.’s sister Florence graduating from high school, an October 1899 trip to visit landmarks in New York City, and visits to the Jersey Shore.

Volume Two: The Christ Church Hospital, Jersey City album (26.5 x 30.5 cm, black leather cover with gilt title) contains approximately 30 professional quality photographs related to Henry Bonynge Jr.'s medical internship in 1906-1907. There are several carefully composed views of hospital exteriors, interiors, equipment, and staff in uniform. Of note is a view across Hoboken rooftops, the Hudson River, to New York City. Also a fine image of the hospital kitchen and staff. Includes one card photograph of employees with a stretcher in front of a hospital ambulance.

Volume Three: The Bonynge family early snapshots album (26.75 x 36.75 cm, black leather cover in poor condition) contains approximately 400 photographs documenting Henry and Elizabeth Bonynge's early years of marriage as well as Marjorie's infancy. Images of interest include photographs of daily life and family trips from 1910 to 1917 in the Bahamas, Bermuda, Lake Waramaug (Connecticut), Prince Edward Island, Lake George (New York), Newport, Rhode Island, Maine, Atlantic City, New Jersey and Mount Vernon, Virginia. Includes notable images of recreational activities, early automobile travel, horseback riding, construction of the Prospect Street house in Ridgewood, New Jersey, and a July 4th parade. Later notes from Susan B. Strange identify many individuals represented in the album in addition to captions written by Elizabeth and/or Henry.

Volume Four: The Bonynge family snapshots album (27.25 x 36.75 cm, black leather cover, poor condition) contains approximately 250 photographs of Henry, Elizabeth and Marjorie. While some of the images included in this album were taken in 1911, most date to ca. 1918-1925. Images of interest include photographs of Marjorie as a young child riding horses (including ‘Lightning’, a Shetland Pony), trips to Niagara Falls, Quebec, and Lake George in 1921, a trip to Mohonk Mountain House in New Paltz, New York in 1922 and a pictures from a "Charley trip," possibly to Wyoming.

Volume Five: The New Preston, Ridgewood, and Nantucket album (24.25 x 36.75 cm, black leather cover) contains approximately 45 high quality photographic prints of people and places in New Preston, Connecticut, and Nantucket, Massachusetts as well as the family home in Ridgewood, New Jersey. There is a partial index for the album which was likely filled out by Marjorie. Images of note include Elizabeth and Marjorie with a pony in 1918, interior photographs of the house at 107 Prospect Street and ten photographs of Nantucket.

Volume Six: The Marjorie Bonynge childhood album (19 x 29.25 cm, black leather cover) contains approximately 40 photographs, including numerous portraits of people and of Marjorie as a child from 1920-1929. Of note is an image of children dressed for a Halloween party.

Volume Seven: The Bonynge European travel album (23.5 x 35.5 cm, black leather cover) contains approximately 70 photographs of a Atlantic crossing aboard the U.S.S. Minnetonka in 1925. The photographs focus on Cherbourg (France), Edinburgh (Scotland), Stratford-upon-Avon, (England), and Volendam (the Netherlands). Images of interest include several views of Henry Bonynge Jr.'s mother's home in Bath, England.

Volume Eight: The Bonynge Wyoming trips album (23.5 x 35.5 cm, black leather cover) contains approximately 65 photographs of a family trip to the Fred Richard Ranch near Cody, Wyoming in 1922. Images include views of hunting, mountain vistas, and horseback riding. There are also copies of three newspaper clippings describing Henry Bonynge Jr.'s near death experience on the trip while hunting.

Volume Nine: The Bonynge Nantucket trips album (23.5 x 35.5 cm, black leather cover) contains approximately 150 photographs of two trips to Nantucket in 1923 and 1924.

Volume Ten: The Bonynge Yellowstone trip album (24.25 x 36.75 cm, black leather cover) contains approximately 150 photographs of a trip to Yellowstone National Park and Shoshone Canyon ca.1920-1922. Notes have been added by both Susan B. Strange and likely Henry Bonynge Jr. Images of interest include photographs of a ranch and horseback riding in an unmarked location, probably near Cody, Wyoming.

The 600 loose photographs in this collection are stored in 11 separate envelopes and have been sorted according to the location they were taken. The majority of these images were taken during a number of family vacations during the 1930s. There are several images that are duplicates of photographs that appear in the albums.

Envelope One and Envelope Two contain approximately 60 images of family, pets, school groups and Ridgewood and Hoboken, New Jersey.

Envelope Three contains approximately 30 images of a cruise to what appears to be Bermuda.

Envelope Four contains approximately 38 images of horses and views of locations in Kentucky.

Envelope Five contains approximately 70 images of multiple trips to Salmon, Idaho. Photographs document the Bonynge family partaking in horseback riding and rodeo at a friend's ranch.

Envelope Six contains approximately 80 images of trips to various locations in the United States from 1936 until ca. 1940. The images have been separated by note cards with locations and dates.

Envelope Seven contains approximately 60 images of a trip taken by Marjorie in March of 1937 to El Salvador and Central America in order to visit a friend from high school named Eva Duke.

Envelopes Eight and Nine contain approximately 170 images from a 1937 Caribbean Cruise aboard the S.S.Quirigua. Many of the images depict Havana, Cuba.

Envelope Ten contains approximately 58 images from a number of unidentified places as well as two photographs from a 1932 trip to Venice, Italy.

Envelope Eleven contains approximately 45 images of unidentified people. Some images appear to be from ca. 1900, though most of the photographs are of friends or neighbors of the Bonynge family in the 1930s.

Biographical / Historical:

Henry "Harry" Arthur Bonynge Jr. (1883-1956) was born to Henry Arthur Bonynge (1846-1931) and Lucy Bonynge née Pollett (1846-1913) in Hoboken, New Jersey. His parents were from Dublin, Ireland and Bath, England respectively. Bonynge Jr. had six siblings; Will (1870-1921), Ada (1872-1946), Walter Robert (1876-1877), Albert "Bert" Walter (1879-1939), Florence "Floss" (1881-1946), and Winfield "Win" (1886-1965).

Henry A. Bonynge Jr. graduated from Hoboken High School in 1901 before obtaining a degree from the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1905. After completing an internship at Christ Church Hospital in Jersey City he moved to Ridgewood, New Jersey to begin his own practice in 1907.

In 1908, Henry Bonynge Jr. married Elizabeth Marjorie "Bessie" (née Leard) (1881-1966), a native of Prince Edward Island who had immigrated to the United States in 1902. They rented a home with office space on 97 Prospect Street in Ridgewood before later building a home further down the block at 107. Around 1928, they moved into another custom home at 337 Crest Road. By 1944, they had retired to Gordonsville, Virginia. Henry Bonynge Jr. raised Aberdeen Angus cattle and American Saddlebred horses later in life and continued to practice medicine part-time long after his retirement. He was an avid and skilled amateur photographer and appears to have taken most of the photographs present in this collection. Both the 337 Crest Street home and the "Ballintobber" house in Gordonsville had darkrooms.

Marjorie Elizabeth Bonynge (1915-1992) was the only child of Henry and Elizabeth Bonynge. She graduated from Knox School in Cooperstown, New York in 1933. Marjorie went on to attend Le Manoir in Switzerland and Mademoiselle Manileve's in Paris. During World War II, she drove an ambulance with the American Red Cross as a member of the Junior League of the City of New York. In 1945, she married Hinman Foot Strange (1917-1993) and had two children, Susan and Edwin. Following their divorce in 1952, Marjorie and her children moved in with her parents in Gordonsville. In the late 1950s, she worked at the Orange County Public Library and later at the Albemarle County Library. Marjorie Strange retired in 1987.

Acquisition Information:
Gift, Susan B. Strange, 1998 and 2017. F-613, F-1140 .
Custodial History:

From Elizabeth Marjorie (Leard) Bonynge (1881-1966) to Marjorie Elizabeth (Bonynge) Strange (1915-1992) to Susan B. Strange.

Arrangement:

The Bonynge family photograph collection is organized into two series:
  • Series I: Photograph Albums (ten volumes)
  • Series II: Loose Photographs (two boxes)

Rules or Conventions:
Finding aid prepared using Describing Archives: A Content Standard (DACS)

Contents

Using These Materials

Info for Visitors

How to Request

Ordering Reproductions

Download PDF Finding Aid
RESTRICTIONS:

The collection is open for research.

USE & PERMISSIONS:

Copyright status is unknown

PREFERRED CITATION:

Bonynge Family Photograph Collection, William L. Clements Library, The University of Michigan

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Collection

Bonynge family photograph collection, ca. 1899-1939
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Total components 14
Last indexed 2023-08-08