Myrtle Bell Moten and Friends, 1929

Courthouse-on-the-Square Museum, Denton Texas. Click to enlarge

I didn’t want to let black history month slip by without a post.  These women aren’t old, but I liked their outfits so much I wanted to include them.  The snapshot comes from the collection of the Moten family, prosperous African Americans in Denton Texas. Only one woman is identified in the photo, Myrtle Bell Moten Dabney on the left.  Her father, Edwin B. Moten, was a prominent local doctor. You can see more family photos here.  Myrtle Bell, born in 1910, would have been about nineteen in this photo.

Where are they, do you think?  Given the nurse in the photo, it might be some kind of summer camp.  Are they volunteer counselors dressed to the nines?  Or might this have been a fancy club? Note that the women in pants and shorts in the front all have bandanas tied around their necks.

Most fascinating is the woman just to the left of the nurse who looks a little older than the rest of the group.  She is wearing her high waisted white pants with such style!

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One Response to Myrtle Bell Moten and Friends, 1929

  1. Lizzie says:

    A fantastic photo! I agree, more information would be so wonderful.
    For what’s it’s worth, I think the dating is off by a few years. I’d put it at around 1932-33.

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