AA-2026-2787B3
On the image
Someone dressed these two boys alike that morning, on the theory that matching striped shirts would make a more pleasing photograph than two children who happened to be wearing whatever they found on the floor. One has been issued a hat, for reasons that were probably about sun protection and definitely also about symmetry, since the picture reads better with one straw brim balancing the composition.
They sit barefoot at the lip of a columnar rock ledge above open water, in the specific confident posture of boys who have not yet been told that basalt breaks off in slabs. Nobody in the frame seems worried about the twenty-foot drop behind them, which was standard parenting practice for the decade: hand the child a good vantage point and trust gravity to mind its own business.
The barren gravel flat behind them, with its scattered figures and what might be a picnic table, suggests a coastal outing rather than a hike to nowhere, the kind of family excursion that produced exactly one roll of slides a summer and made every frame count.
The historian's note
The photograph documents a mid-twentieth-century family excursion to a coastline shaped by exposed columnar basalt, a rock type formed by the slow cooling of ancient lava flows into hexagonal or blocky columns. Such formations, found along stretches of the New England and Maritime Canadian coast among other places, were popular informal tourist stops by the 1950s, valued for their dramatic look and easy accessibility from shore.
The matching striped shirts worn by the two boys reflect a common practice of the period, in which parents dressed siblings identically for outings and photographs, a custom rooted in both economy of shopping and a prevailing aesthetic that prized visual uniformity in family portraiture.
No specific site, individuals, or event can be confirmed from the image alone; the scene represents a private family record typical of amateur color photography from the decade, made on the small-format transparency film that became widely available to home photographers after the Second World War.
Subjects & keywords — each links to a search
Visually related — by likeness
Two Boys in Matching Stripes on Basalt Rocks, 1950s. 1950–1959. Archive & Atlas, Historical Image Library, AA-2026-2787B3. https://thearchive.archiveandatlas.com/library/two-boys-in-matching-stripes-on-basalt-rocks-1950s.
@misc{aaAA20262787B3,
title = {Two Boys in Matching Stripes on Basalt Rocks, 1950s},
year = {1950–1959},
howpublished = {Archive \& Atlas, Historical Image Library},
note = {Accession AA-2026-2787B3},
url = {https://thearchive.archiveandatlas.com/library/two-boys-in-matching-stripes-on-basalt-rocks-1950s}
}TY - ART TI - Two Boys in Matching Stripes on Basalt Rocks, 1950s PY - 1950–1959 PB - Archive & Atlas, Historical Image Library AN - AA-2026-2787B3 UR - https://thearchive.archiveandatlas.com/library/two-boys-in-matching-stripes-on-basalt-rocks-1950s ER -
From the community
Identifications, corrections, and discussion from readers — reviewed by a librarian before appearing here.
Sign in to add an identification, correction, or comment.
No notes yet — be the first to add what you know about this image.