Pile Driver

Title

Pile Driver

Description

Three men stand on a pile driver which is pounding a large log into the ground. The log was probably a support for a bridge or road constructed near Forest Grove, Oregon; possibly in Gales Creek or the Hillside neighborhood. A recently-logged hill sits in the background. The photographer, William Alonso Clapshaw, exposed half of a glass plate negative to create this image. The other half of the glass plate was used to make another photograph that probably portrays the same bridge construction event; see image PUA_MS154_012b. Flaws in the photograph are due to dust and deterioration of the emulsion layer on the negative.
This is one image from a set of glass plate negatives created by William Alonso Clapshaw. Clapshaw was a clerk and shopkeeper who lived near Forest Grove, Oregon for most of his life. He was born in 1880, probably at the family's home in the Hillside neighborhood of Forest Grove, on what is now Clapshaw Hill Road east of Gales Creek. Around 1910-1914, William took an interest in photography and created a set of glass plate negatives documenting scenes near his family's lands as well as images of himself, his friends and family members. He most likely used a silver gelatin dry plate process. The photographs were donated to the Pacific University Archives in 2023.

Date: Display

circa 1910-1914

Identifier

PUA_MS154_012a

Medium

Gelatin silver negatives

Copyright

http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/CNE/1.0/