Picture This

Artifiacts in this featured collection are part of the OMCA's Picture This website. More about the context and history of each of these artifacts is available at Picture This

About Picture This: California's Perspectives on American History is a resource for teachers and students to learn about the experiences of diverse peoples of California by using primary source images from the Oakland Museum of California's collections. Organized into eleven time periods spanning from pre-1769 to the present, more than 300 photographs, drawings, posters, and prints tell stories from the perspectives of different ethnic groups. Historical contexts are provided to offer a framework of California's role in relation to American history.

The National Archives state that primary sources, "fascinate students because they are real and they are personal: history is humanized through them." Picture This invites students to examine the historical record, encouraging them to connect history with real people and explore how images tell stories and convey historical evidence about the human experience. History becomes more than just a series of facts, dates, and events.

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Pipe City M.L. Cohen, photographer 1932 At the end of Nineteenth Avenue, Oakland, homeless men created the community "Pipe City" living in the surplus lengths of sewer pipe belonging to the American Concrete and Steel Pipe Company on...	(Sharpshooters of the 1856 Committee of Vigilance) unknown 05/15/56 Vigilance Committee Sharpshooters. Condition: very good. The first Vigilance Committe disbanded in 1851. But there was a continuing perception of violence in San Franicisco. The tide of unrest...
photograph unknown 1944 Group portrait of braceros who were brought up during World War II to work on the Southern Pacific Railroad lines here in Oakland. They are posed on the railroad tracks in Oakland.	photograph Associated Press 02/16/41 Tribune caption on the back, Feb. 16, 1941, "The sprawling Lockheed aircraft factory at Burbank yesterday came under the critical inspection of Sir Hugh Dowding, British air defense chief,...
lantern slide Lantern slides. Description: Scenes of San Francisco. "Pre-Fire Chinatown"	Ronnie is my choice in '68 Holyoke, Inc., MA, Posters 1968\|1967 Poster. Description: "Ronnie is my choice in '68". Cartoon portrait of Ronald Reagan. Polychrome photolithography on white poster stock. Condition 1; unopened in plastic bag....
Stop the War Berkeley, University Of California 1970 Poster on white paper, silk screened in dark green. (Printed on the back of old computer print-outs.) Image is of a fist, "Stop the War". This is one of the many Vietnam War Protest posters...	Americae Pars VIII: Franciscus Draco Theodore De Bry 1599 APPROXIMATE DATE: 1599 NOTES: This is from the Latin edition. ARTIST BIRTH: 1528 ARTIST DEATH: 1598
Chinese Joss House, San Francisco, California J. J. Reilly, John James Reilly circa 1875 This is an Albumen Stereograph card that depicts the interior of a Joss House (a place of worship for indigenous Chinese religions). Twin images are mounted on cardboard and show a highly...	Chinese Merchant and Wife, San Francisco, California J. J. Reilly, John James Reilly circa 1875 This is an Albumen Stereograph card that depicts a Chinese merchant and his wife sitting for a studio portrait. Twin images are mounted on cardboard and show a man sitting on the right and a...
photograph Bradley & Rulofson, Eadweard Muybridge Stereoscopic views. Scenes of Modoc War neighborhood. Acc. # 26.102 is a negative	Maidu Walk Dalbert Castro, Nisenan, Painter 1980 (`Memory and Imagination: The Legacy of Maidu Indian Artist Frank Day' Rebecca J. Dobkins with Carey T. Caldwell and Frank R. LaPena. 1997. pp. 86 & 103) Maidu Walk (1980) tells the...
Aw Lawm I (Long Rock) Dalbert Castro 1979 This is an acrylic painting on canvas that shows a bear standing on its hind feet and reaching upward with its claws toward two deer that are standing on a tall rock. The scene takes place in a...	photograph unknown c. 1875 The image shows a Chinese miner holding a yoke over his shoulders carrying mining equipment including a rocker or long-tom, and pick-ax and shovel.
photoprint E. J. Muybridge \| Bradley & Rulofson 1873 Stereo Photograph. Description: From "The Modoc War" series. Shows cave mouth. Albumen stereo. Muybridge's logo appears verso. 8.7cm x 17.6cm. Title: 1602 - Capt. Jack's Cave in the Lava...	photograph Lonnie Wilson 07/14/68 Photograph of a rally to free Huey Newton which took place in front of the Alameda County Court House in Oakland. People are carrying signs that say "Free Huey". A woman is standing on top of a...
photograph Lonnie Wilson 07/15/68 This is a rally to free Huey Newton held in front of the Alameda County Court House. Lake Merritt is visible in the background. There is a bus with signs that read "HUEY for Congress, Black...	photograph Lonnie Wilson 05/19/69 Photo depicts: A line of about a dozen National Guard troops walk across Sproul Administration steps with guns out in front of them. A few students can be seen walking in front of them.
photograph Klamath River Indian \| A.W. Ericson \| Hupa c.1881-1910 Photographs of Indian life. "White deer skin dance, Hupa Tribe, Athapascan family, no. cailf." info from the OMCA green/blue "cross-file record of pictures" paper found in...	photograph Klamath River Indian \| A.W. Ericson \| Hupa c.1880-1910 Photographs of Indian life. "White deer skin dance, Hupa Tribe, Athapascan family, no. cailf." info from the OMCA green/blue "cross-file record of pictures" paper found in...
photograph Klamath River Indian \| A.W. Ericson \| Hupa 1900 Photographs of Indian life. The photo depicts people gathered to observe the white deer skin dance. Men, women and children sit and stand in a forested clearing facing people performing the...	photograph Klamath River Indian \| A.W. Ericson \| Hupa c.1880-1910 Photographs of Indian life. "Indian sweat house, Pecwan, Hupa Tribe, Athapascan family, no. cailf." info from the OMCA green/blue "cross-file record of pictures" paper found...
photograph Klamath River Indian \| A.W. Ericson \| Hupa c.1880-1910 Photographs of Indian life. "Indian woman, Hupa Tribe, Athapascan family, Klamath River" info from the OMCA green/blue "cross-file record of pictures" paper found in the...	photograph CA \| California, Klamath River Indian \| A.W. Ericson \| Hupa c.1880-1910 Photographs of Indian life. Photographs of Indian life. Photo is of Mrs. Childs, Trinidad, who was 100 years old and blind at time of original photo; (with photo) "The Indian attitude to...