Michael Lehr Antiques
Live Auction

September 2026 Vernacular Photo History Auction

Sat, Sep 19, 2026 11:00AM EDT
  2026-09-19 11:00:00 2026-09-19 11:00:00 America/New_York Michael Lehr Michael Lehr : September 2026 Vernacular Photo History Auction https://auction.michaellehrantiques.com/auctions/michael-lehr-antiques/september-2026-vernacular-photo-history-auction-24380
Our September 2026 auction is anchored by two remarkable private collections, together making up about half the sale, alongside a broader selection of consignments spanning early photography, Civil War material, and vernacular imagery. The Soffer Collection, built with an eye for rarity and historical significance, is particularly strong in vernacular portraiture, Native American photographs, and Iowa Civil War imagery. The Palmer, Massachusetts collection, much of it found at Brimfield, centers on maker-marked daguerreotypes from the golden age of the American daguerreian studio.
Michael Lehr Antiques info@michaellehrantiques.com
Lot 601

Real Photo Postcard, Camp Benson Swastika Team, 1907

Estimate: $100 - $200
Starting Bid
$50

Bid Increments

Price Bid Increment
$0 $5
$100 $10
$200 $25
$500 $50
$1,000 $100
$2,000 $250
$5,000 $500
$10,000 $1,000
$20,000 $2,000
$50,000 $5,000
Seven young women stand in a row outdoors against a backdrop of dense leafy trees, each wearing a large swastika emblem on the front of her blouse — a pre-Nazi-era good luck symbol used widely in American youth and athletic culture in the early twentieth century. One woman wears a dark blouse while the others wear white, and all but one sport wide-brimmed white hats with dark bow ties at their collars. Three boys in casual shirts and caps sit cross-legged on the grass in front of the women, several holding what appear to be baseball gloves or caps in their laps.

The group portrait has the relaxed, confident quality of a sports team photograph, and the swastika emblem on each uniform blouse identifies the squad by name rather than by ideology. The women's pleated dark skirts and matching neckwear give the group a unified, uniformed appearance consistent with organized camp athletics of the period.

Before its association with National Socialism, the swastika was a widely adopted symbol of good fortune across Native American, South Asian, and popular Western culture, and its use by American summer camp teams in the 1900s and 1910s was common and entirely benign in its intent. Camp Benson was an established summer camp, and this card documents a game result of 20 to 5 in favor of the Swastika team on August 22, 1907.

The reverse bears a one-cent Benjamin Franklin stamp of the Series 1902 issue, a handwritten inscription reading "Camp Benson, Aug. 22, '07. 20 to 5 in favor of The [swastika drawn]," and is addressed to L. Eileen Titcomb, Newport, Maine. The initials "L.B.S." appear at lower left, and a penciled "5-" is noted at upper right.

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