The university knows very little about the collection or the family for which it’s named. It’s not even clear how and when exactly the photos were acquired. A former library director thinks the collection may have been purchased from a local dealer in the 1990s. About eight years ago, the images were scanned and added to the school’s digital archive along with a note: “If you can help identify members of the Lynch Family and other unidentified persons in any of the photos, or if you are a member of the Lynch family and own any other images and/or photographs, please reach out to us as we would be happy to add your items to our collection!” No one has ever contacted the archives.
But these images don’t have to be anonymous forever. For intrepid researchers, there are hints embedded within them that could reveal the stories of these people and places. There are a few family names recorded in the archive alongside those of the Lynches: Bowman, Brown, Floyd, Hall, Williams. There are some locations identified beyond New Orleans and Rayville: Houston and San Antonio, Texas; Hot Springs National Park, Arkansas; and Bordeaux, France. And there are a handful of photography studios mentioned: Dixie, Magnolia, Perrault’s, Porters, and Walters, the names offering a tour of businesses in central New Orleans in the early and mid-twentieth century. Arthur Perrault, a Black man whose sister Florestine Perrault Collins was also a noted New Orleans photographer in the early twentieth century, was likely behind a tender image of a toddler in the Xavier archive. The young girl looks uncertain about the whole endeavor and unwilling to sit still a moment longer.
A knowledge of the history of photography and its technological changes could suggest a timeline. (I got some help in this endeavor from Marguerite Roby, a Smithsonian photo archivist.) There are tintypes and cabinet cards, prints with white borders, and some with elaborately decorated ones. All of the images are two-toned, except one photograph from 1970 showing a Mardi Gras Indian and two bystanders caught unaware; the photographer appears as a shadow. Fashion lovers, interior design nerds, and architecture obsessives could also help date some images. Car buffs could provide context for a series of photographs of women posing alongside now-vintage vehicles, possibly in Texas—though they may not be able to explain why one has a gun dangling from her right hand.