The Nuclear Family

A former but longtime friend of mine asked me to touch up some photos of her father, Bill, and gave me this image as one of them. It is an image of her mother, older brother (who is my age), and her dad. I thought this was a very good representation of the fifty's look in the U.S., a time when I was growing up. That was the time of the "nuclear family", when the U.S. first confronted the threat of weapons of mass destruction, i.e. the atomic bomb. I love the period clothes and that classic fifty's look. The touch up was fun but challenging too.

 

 

To see how her dad looks about fifty years later, click here.

 

 

Here's her brother, Michael, about 50 years later. Mike is the personnel director for a trucking company.

Her mother, 50 years hence.

You did such a great job on the touch up, I can't tell you touched it up! But that is the point, right? Nice job!

 

I love images from the 50's & 60's. I remember it well. It is a whole lifetime away. There was this "feeling" of safety, even in the midst of all the turmoil, we kids still felt safe. You just knew everything was going to work out in the end, like a "Leave it to Beaver" episode :) But..... today it seems a different story. Maybe it's just age, probably more mature thinking :)

However, I remember wandering the streets of our small town at age 4 & never feeling afraid. There really was no one lurking out there with ill intentions. It's sad our grandchildren will never know this safety.

 

The feeling is well captured in this image! I love Michael's smile & the way he has his arms crossed, really sweet!

 

Insomniac at work:)

Fascinating photo. Was the music in the background Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, or Lionel Hampton?

Excellent capture with nice expression & tonal range, great framing, well achieved, Ken!!! Best regards.

Nice job Ken.

Ken, people looked so different in the 50's...Real nice work you did on it.I went to see the man nowadays, and liked it than and like it very much now, time was good to him.Interesting.

You've restored a photo of the 50's in a wonderful way, Ben. It's aphoto that speaks of the peiod and shows happiness. Love the cute expression on the kid's face.

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Great! Thanks for sharing, do you have more?

Full of nostalgic, Ken. Flawless touch-ups.

She's still a beautiful woman. What I'm wondering is how in the world they got that child to fold his arms so "officially". Wonderful image! I'm contemplating a summer project: scanning all of the old family photos that I can get my hands on. This is definitely an inspiration.

Excellent thought and execution. Original and very nice work.

I love these old photos. Looks perfect to me. I really enjoyed looking at the photos of how everyone looks now. Photos are really so important. Everyone on TV during the hurricane mentioned losing all their photos. Someone once asked me, if I had to leave my house fast, which photo album would I take......

 

Good work!