Photographs we have collected (and still own) and some now housed within public collections
Carol Eyerman & Port of Embarkation c.1950
Gael Newton AM, January 2025
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| Carol Eyerman, Port of Embarkation c.1950 |
This cherished photograph by Carol Eyerman (1910- 1995) of Port of Embarkation at night San Francisco c.1950 is another in our collection that I kept when we moved to Melbourne. Many others from my collection of women photographers were dispersed. But that’s another story*.
While I have owned this photograph for a couple of decades, it is only now that I have had time to do the research on it. Amazingly I soon discovered that there is very little information about Carol Eyerman.
She was married to another well-known LIFE photographer, JR Eyerman. While information about JR Eyerman’s career including his time with LIFE is easily accessible, scant information is presently online about Carol apart from an obituary and some articles in Californian papers indicating she was well known as a photographer and a contributor to LIFE in her own right from the 1940s.
A main reason I had bought this image way back then was that it reminded me of Berenice Abbott’s wonderful night time views of New York that I could not afford. My print has a typescript label on the back saying; ’85 Port of Embarkation piers and Harbor Island shipyards at night’ and ink stamp, ‘Photographed for LIFE by Carol Eyerman’.
Initially I had thought that this was also a view of a New York port. It was later when I realised on closer inspection that in fact I had bought a photograph of a well-known San Francisco scene. The near view is of the city streets with the middle view being of the massive San Francisco Port of Embarkation, built in 1912-15. This port had been crucial for American military operations in the Pacific during World War II when over a million and a half soldiers passed through the Port. |
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Carol Eyerman, sourced ancestry.com |
The print has typescript label with a number suggests it was part of a suite of images. However, I could not find this image in the LIFE archives and currently cannot find what happened to Carol’s archive.
It certainly changes things to realise that is luminous night scene is not glamorous New York but a location with a very special meaning to American viewers. It is hard to date but likely after 1942 when Carol was listed as a North West region photographer-reporter for Life when she and JR were featured in an article in the News Tribune of Tacoma on 14 October 1942. The couple met in 1941 and married in 1942.
Carol was born Carol Lewis in Denver and from 1916 lived in Tacoma with her mother and stepfather and graduated from Lincoln High School. In 1930 she was listed as working in a department store. How she acquired skill in photography is not documented nor how she met her husband.
She managed their Tacoma photographic studio during the war years. After the War, the couple lived in New York where Carol is reported to have founded several arts magazines. Her obituary notes she was an artist and photographer but I have not found any of her paintings.
The Eyermans moved to Santa Monica in 1947 and JR continued working for Life until 1961 from when he went worked on a contract basis. Both did a wide range of assignments, social events, society and wedding portraits. The couple resided in Santa Monica until their deaths in 1985 and 1995. |
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JR and Carol Eyerman, Tacome News 1942 |
Both received obituaries in local papers. They had a son William and daughters Kathryn and Elizabeth. There is a listing on Ancestry that I have made inquiries to.
JR has extensive citations as a great LIFE photographer notable for innovations and technical expertise; he was an engineer by training. Carol does not get a mention in any of his obituaries or write ups. Yet she is also noted as having had 23 covers for Sunset magazine. The image below is possibly one of those.
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| Wenatchee Valley- Carol Eyerman |
Sadly a taped interview about JR with contribution from Carol is listed as missing from the California archive.
The Port of Embarkation picture is intriguing. It casts a major war time junction however it is likely the image is postwar. Where Carol was when she took the photograph is not clear.
Despite the frustration of not yet being able to reveal more about Carol and her archive, I do have the satisfaction of knowing that the image is technically and artistically up there with Abbott’s views of New York metropolis and Brassai’s wonderful magic of Paris by night.
It would be wonderful if anyone could identify the site/ building from which Carol took the photograph – and any other information about the view she captured.
Does anyone know anything about the whereabouts of her archive?
If anyone has further information of links to more about this talented photographer, please make contact.
The research on Carol Eyerman continues.
* I mentioned above the story about the dispersal of many of my photographs by women photographers,
I have uploaed a piece on this to my blog - click here. (link coming soon)
more of Gael Newton's Essays and Articles
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