Taken at Old Plank about 1963. Me with my cousins, Blair, Jan and Dale. They seem to be trying to pose for the photographer while I am about to cause trouble with that ball. I was a senior at Northwestern High School in Detroit. Old Plank was 30 minutes outside of Detroit near Wixom. We had 2 acres with a big house and although there was talk of moving there, we didn’t. We went for weekends to get out of the city until 1967, after the riot when the printing business lost the businesses that burned or left. At the same time, a man bought the barn and let his chickens and hogs run lose. Before he and Henry came to blows, they sold him the house.
There were two more photographs taken that same day. I think they were taken in the order shown below. My uncle Henry took the photos and developed them at the print shop that he and Hugh ran at the time – Cleage Printers.
A really neat photo. Blair – if he’s the older of your cousins? – appears to have cultivated quite a bicep there. 🙂 Sad, but smart of Henry to sell the house. I can’t imagine the place was very tidy with hogs & chickens running around loose. Bummer!
I fixed the labeling, Blair is the youngest. Dale is the one with the bicep like a baseball 😉
Great photo!
Makes me smile to remember those days.
Wonderful picture –I wish that there was a second photo taken a few seconds later that showed what you did with the ball.
I just added two more photos taken that day in order (I think!) Good idea, wish I’d thought of it in the first place.
LOL – I love it. It’s so much fun to see cousins enjoying each other–and coming up with a really creative idea for a photo. I’m glad my comment prompted you to add the other photos.
I love your family photos. They’re beautiful and full of love. Thank you for sharing them.
Thank you for appreciating!
Another beautifully natural photo. So many children miss out on having space to play like that.
I was just thinking about that as I posted this. My grandchildren have not had the country experiences that we had growing up.
What a great photos! So clear too!
My husband said the same thing last night.
Love all the muscles!
🙂
Oh! Those braids, those ribbons and those glasses! LOL
Oh, you were so cute! And your expression in the first photo remains the same today.
So is that really Dale’s bicep, or just a smaller ball? I’m not sure what’s happening in the first photo in the lineup, but we know where the basketball is in the third shot!
It was a baseball. I think I was feeling Dale’s “muscle” as I got into line.
What a neat memento of you and your cousins. I have just a few photos of mine and I love to look at them and remember those days. Now I rarely see my cousins anymore.
I see some of my cousins every few years, some not for decades. All depends on how far away I live from them.
Love it!
What wonderful photos of kids horsing around for a camera. You did fit the meme of balls being used in different ways.
You were adorable. I laughed out loud at the last photo. Mrs. Muscles.
A super photo with an interesting inverted V pose that adds animation. The depth of tone in black and white film is hard to match with today’s digital.
We played everyday with a ball just like the children on your pictures. we did not have a mobile or an ipad to play with!!
The clarity of the first picture is something. Wonderful stuff.
That’s great sense of mischief being put to good use.