Smile for the Camera

I have to admit I've always enjoyed taking photos more than being in them. That being said, I do understand the permanency of a photo. What's there is there.

I've never understood when someone would make a face just as their picture was being taken. Don't they understand that is what it will show or do they think the person will throw it away if they don't look good?

These two photos were obviously taken on the same day at my Grandpa Green's house in Perry, Florida, in the mid 1950s. I don't know which was first but the one with him alone shows him, not exactly smiling but sitting dignified in a lawn chair while his son Alton took the photo. You can't really see it in the photo but he is dressed up with a bow tie on.





This second shot has Alton's wife Dinah sitting on the side of the chair and him not very happy looking at all. I have no idea why he made such a face. As far as I know he liked Dinah and she was certainly the best looking woman who would sit in his lap that day.

Era Dinah Dorough was born in 1903 in Tallassee, Elmore County Alabama to Fleet Cooper and Mary Susan Graden Dorough. She and my uncle Alton Green were married in 1951 in Jacksonville, Florida and then again 12 years later. They got a divorce in between but I don't remember that event. They split up for good in 1966.  

Dinah was very friendly and since neither she or Alton ever had children, took to the four in our family. I remember them always bringing some kind of gift, even if it was just a large box of candy. Alton owned a candy vending business in Jacksonville so he always came bearing gifts fit for a 10 year old boy.

Dinah moved to live with her sister Ruby Martin in Hickory, North Carolina after the divorce and was there when she died in 1988. She is buried in the Hopewell United Methodist Church Cemetery in Catawba County.    



An interesting fact about these photos. The 2nd one is the only one I knew about until just recently. It was the one Alton kept and when he died at my parent's home in 1976 my Dad ended up with it.

The first photo (the good one) Alton sent to his niece and my cousin, Doris Green Parramore, in Tallahassee. After she died it ended up with her daughter Karen and she sent me a copy of it earlier this year.