For Women’s History Month this year I will tell you about three of the many photographers in our state outside of Atlanta who worked with a sibling. Two of the three were photographer sisters, and the other, a sister and brother photographers. In the following paragraphs, these pairs are in alphabetical, not chronological order, but they all worked at about the same time in their respective locations of Milledgeville, Savannah, and Athens. See also my post on the Misses Mead, another pair of sisters who had quite a long career in Atlanta as photographers.

The Misses Ellison were sisters Florrie (1874 – 1952) and Della (1876 – 1971) Elllison who took over the J. A. Fairfield (McDannell’s) photographic studio in Milledgeville as of November 1898, as reported in the Council Proceedings of November 21, 1898 — “The petition of Misses Ellison to have Photographic license of J.A. Fairfield transferred to them, was read and motion granted” (Union Recorder November 29, 1898, pg. 8), although James A. Fairfied had already published a notice in the Union Recorder informing the public that he had sold the business “to the Misses Della and Florra [sic] Ellison.” He mentions that in 1897-1898, Della Ellison, a graduate of the College in Milledgeville, was apprenticed to former Milledgeville photographer Charles F. McDannell (partner with Fairfield in that city’s studio and J.A. Fairfield’s brother-in-law), who was by then in Atlanta. Fairfield’s father, photographer T. J. Fairfield (1845-1915) would work with them in the studio for one month. As of 1899, the Misses Ellison were paying an annual $10.00 tax on their Photograph Gallery (“Report of Tax Collector, July 6, 1899 — special taxes collected for 1899” in Union Recorder, July 18, 1899, pg. 6).

The two sisters did not place paid advertisements for their studio in the local newspaper, and it may have been too expensive for them. What they did do was have a few lines about their service inserted into the “personal” and “local” columns of the Union Recorder. In the Union Recorder‘s “Local Mentions” column of March 14, 1899, pg. 2, is a notice close to being an actual advertisement, telling all that “Everyone should be up-to-date by wearing a photo button of your wife, husband, child, or sweetheart” and that the Misses Ellison’s Studio” had different styles on offer.” In another ad in the December 11, 1900 issue, pg.2, signed by the Misses Ellison, they warn readers to “Avoid all rush, by having your photos taken for Xmas gifts at once.”

Advertisements appeared in the Union Recorder September 1903, and May 1904, for Sperry & Hutchinson who listed the Misses Ellison under Photographers among the several local businesses who were giving out the S&H company’s “Green Stamps,” with every ten cents spent. Businesses continued this practice of giving Green Stamps through much of the twentieth century. (Union Recorder Sept. 15, 1903, pg. 7, and May 10, 1904, pg. 4).

Other entries in the newspaper’s Personal columns help us keep up with the two. In August 1905, Della was attending the Southern School of Photography in McMinnville, Tennessee (Union Recorder, August 15, 1905, pg. 5, col.1). You may remember reading about Della and this school, as well as about these sisters, in my March 2023 post on Educating Women Photographers. In June 1906, Della Ellison was attending the “photographers convention” in Atlanta, and in February 1907, Florrie was attending the (same) “Southern Association of Photographers” in Atlanta for one week (June 26, 1906, pg. 11 col. 4; February 5, 1907, pg. 5).

After being in business only twelve years, the Misses Ellison sold their studio to a Mr. E. W. Ross, who immediately sold it to H. A. (Harrison Ashley) Smith (b. 1881), a photographer who had been living in Milledgeville and working and advertising regularly as a photographer. Listed as a traveling photographer in the 1910 census, he had several more permanant locations in the city. Thus, with this studio purchase, he was able to “enlarge his business and render more efficient service.” He probably left Milledgeville around 1918. He previously worked as a photographer in Dublin, Georgia, 1900-1903, and Smith continued in that line into 1940, when the census lists him as a helper in a photography shop.

Once the Misses Ellison sold their business, they went their separate ways. By 1920, Florrie was a librarian at the Milledgeville public library, but by 1930 she had moved to Orlando, Florida to live with sister, Anna, who was over twenty years younger, and their mother.

Della moved to Baltimore and worked with the Backrack [sic] (Bachrach) Photography Co., then left that business to work for the U. S. Bureau of Accounting in Washington, D.C. Retired, she moved to Miami in 1955. Before that move, her sister Florrie Belle Ellison died in Miami, Florida, on January 25, 1952. Della lived on in Miami and outlived her sister by almost twenty years. She died there on December 3, 1971. The two are buried in Memory Hill Cemetery, Milledgeville.

The Launey sisters were the daughters of Savannah photographer A. R. (Arthur Rene) Launey (1843-1908). Their father, born in New Orleans (family Laneau, Launey), bought out the studio of well-known Savannah photographers D. J. Ryan, announced in September 1885, and along with George Goebel, bought out O.P. Havens in April 1886, and eventually formed Launey’s Studio. The advertisement announcing refurbishment of the former Ryan gallery, stated that Launey was “of Illinois, formerly New Orleans” (Savannah Morning News September 22, 1885, pg. 4, col. 4).

Two of his of his daughters, I (Ira) Garnett (born in Washington, Louisiana, 1871) and Gazelle (born Marie Gazelle in Shelbyville, Illinois, 1873) also worked at their father’s photography studio. By 1900, “I. Garnett, Miss” was listed in the Savannah city directory as “artist, Launey’s Studio.” She studied watercolor in “the north” in 1904, and exhibited her watercolors at times in their Studio. She held the position of artist at Launey Studio until she began to manage the business in 1913, that her sister Gazelle, under the name of “Mrs. G. Launey Stuart,” had managed since 1908. Both sisters were photographers.

Married in 1896 to James D. Stuart, Gazelle was widowed before 1910. She remarried in 1913 to J.L. Riddle and moved with him to Jacksonville, Florida. That year she was listed as assistant manager, and her sister Garnett began the management of the Launey Studio. After her marriage in May, Gazelle Riddle moved with her husband to his home in Hickory, North Carolina, and Garnett continued to manage Launey Studio alone.

Before Gazelle’s remarriage, the sisters were highlighted on the cover of the September 1912 issue of Portrait, a magazine published by the Ansco Company highlighting the printing paper they called Cyko. Portrait‘s editors stated they were “devoted to art-in-portraiture.” On page 15 they wrote about “Our Cover Portrait and the Hall of Fame” and “(take) much pleasure in reproducing the portrait of The Launey Sisters on the cover….” They give an abbreviated history of the sisters’ father’s founding of the Studio. They state that (they believe) “the ultimate success of the Launey Sisters is a just reward for devotion to their art by filial affection.” The editors close with “The Launey Sisters join in the world-wide chorus of praises for Professional Cyko which is the printing medium they use exclusively….stamping their strong individuality on their pictures.” Unfortunately, a photograph reproduced on page 14 as theirs, was by another photographer and was pointed out in the next issue.

In January 1913, Launey Studio moved from their 21 Broughton Street, west, address, where the business was located for twenty-five years, to upstairs at 5 1/2 York Street, east, opposite the Court House.

In mid-June 1914 the annual Photographers Association of America, with about 1,000 delegates, was held in Atlanta, Georgia, and the Launey Studio (Garnett) and at least five other Georgia photographers were there. Temperatures were well into the 90s — it was hot. The cartoon by Alfred W. Brewerton, whose cartoons appeared in Atlanta newspapers, 1910-1920, suggests the heat was a part of the city’s Welcome (“Photographers Gather for Annual Convention,” Atlanta Journal, June 15, 1914, pg. 1, col. 5 and pg. 5, col. 2-3) .

According to the caption on a photograph of “little Miss Eugenia Granger, made by Launey Studio several years ago” reproduced in the Savannah Press on September 5, 1917 (pg. 16, col. 2-3), this photograph was “one of the prize pictures at the National Convention of Photographers held in Atlanta last June, and was hung in a conspicuous place in the salon.”

The Launey Studio did not advertise widely, with only short ads published occasionally, and depended on word-of-mouth and the long-recognized name of their Studio. The Launey, or Launey’s Studio name appeared as a cutline on many Savannah Press newspaper photographs of engaged, married, or society women, and of children, from at least 1913 into the 1920s. Well established, Garnett Launey began closing the Studio for a few months each summer or fall and would travel, usually with her mother, to see relatives around the country. When the studio would stay open for the summer, a special announcement by Launey Studio would be published.

On Saturday July 21, 1923, the Savannah Press published an article titled “Miss Launey Sells Her Studio Here,” telling readers the new owner would be Gonville de Ovies (aka deOvies), a North Carolina photographer. Miss Launey would leave “about the middle of August …..(and) will open a studio in Dallas.” A short history of the founding of the Launey Studio followed, ending with “She has taken pictures of some of the most prominent people in Savannah as well as visitors to the city. Her pictures are very artistic and they are looked upon as works of photographic art.”

Garnett did move a few months later to Dallas, Texas, with her mother Mary, to live near her brother George Launey, a Dallas businessman. Garnett did not open a photo studio, but the two women remained in Dallas until moving to Lakeland, Florida sometime before 1930, perhaps for Mary’s health. Mary died there in April 1931. After burying their mother in Savannah, Garnett moved to Hickory, North Carolina, to live with her sister Gazelle. In 1932, Garnett, and Gazelle and her husband, traveled to and from France, returning to Hickory via New York.

Gazelle was widowed again in 1938, and joined by Garnett, the two were very active in Hickory community organizations, as they had been in Savannah. Both women lived in Hickory until their deaths, Garnett died in February 1953, a month before her 82nd birthday, “at the home of her sister,” after living in that city for twenty years. Garnett’s North Carolina death record lists her as “retired artist,” and an extensive obituary for her appeared in the Hickory Daily Record (Feb. 13, 1953, pg.1, pg.10) mentioning her years as a photographer, but also her “beautiful miniature paintings.”

Gazelle died at 81, in December 1959. The Hickory Daily Record also wrote highly of “Mrs. Riddle” and mentioned the Savannah photography studio. She came to Hickory as a bride in 1913, and was “prominent in Hickory social, religious, and gardening activities for over forty-five years.” (“Mrs. Riddle’s Death” Dec. 30, 1959, pg.1, 3, col. 3 and “Lovable Lady” pg. 6 col. 1-2). The sisters were buried in Savannah’s Bonaventure Cemetery, as were their parents and other siblings.

I had forgotten that I have written before on this next pair of siblings in a 2021 post called “More Unknown Women in Georgia Photography“. To repeat myself a bit, in September 1904, South Carolina’s Newberry Weekly Herald printed an item titled “Located in Georgia” reporting that “Mr. Jesse Salter has accepted a position in Athens, Georgia as manager of one of the leading photograph galleries of that city,…[he] has had a great deal of experience…..an excellent photographer.”

Jesse Sheppard Salter (1879 – 1913) took over the former studio and location of Mrs. M. I. McAdam, and began working in Athens in June 1904, and “his sister will join him in a few weeks” according to Newberry’s The Herald and News (July 5, 1904, pg. 8). His sister, Mamie Elaida Salter (1874 – 1956) probably joined him in the Athens photo business by August. They began advertising together as J.S. and Miss M.E. Salter, Artists, doing “A Full Line of Art and Photo Work” at 115-2 Broad Street (Clark County Courier, September 9, 1904, pg. 3, last column). They continued advertising together and by December referred to their photo studio as Silver Star, and customers should look for the place with the “Red Stairs.”

The Salter siblings were two of the children of Newberry, South Carlina photographer Jesse Zebulon Salter (1815 – 1910) — five of his children went into the business of photography. The business in Athens was likely part of J.Z. Salter’s expansion plan, according to historian Harvey Teal (Partners With the Sun by Harvey S. Teal, 2001, pg. 204).

Sometime in 1906, they began to call the business the Salter Art Studio. By the end of 1906, Mamie was not listed with Jesse, and in 1909, she was married to South Carolina legislator, Arthur Kibler (Newberry Weekly Herald, Oct. 19, 1909, pg. 12, col. 3). Jesse remained in business in Athens, calling his studio Salter Photograph Co.

In July 1907, while still in Athens, Jesse married Helen Auchers, and the couple moved to Spartanburg, South Carolina, where, according to the 1908 city directory, he worked for his siblings Otway and Elizabeth in their Salter Studio. By the time of the 1910 census, the couple was living in in Lake City, Florida where he farmed. They had three children before Jesse Salter died, at age 34, on July 2, 1913, leaving Helen a young widow with their two living children (Newberry Herald and News, July 4, 1913).

I hope you find these sibling photographers as interesting as I do. If you have additional information or questions on any of them, contact me.

© E. Lee Eltzroth and Hunting & Gathering, 2025. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material, including photographs, without written permission from this blog’s author, is prohibited. With permission, excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to E. Lee Eltzroth and Hunting & Gathering, with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.