WWII Soldier's 31 Rolls of Film Are Finally Developed

[DougGuy]

Stumbled across this site, thought it a worthy story to post. The photos are very cool.

During World War II, an unidentified American soldier filled 31 rolls of film with photos that he never got to, or had cause to, see developed. Over 70 years later, The Rescued Film Project acquired these rolls and painstakingly developed them in a kitchen sink. Dozens of never-before-seen photos of life during the War were revealed, in remarkable condition considering the decades they had spent tightly wound in a film canister.
This 10-minute video from The Rescued Film Project details how the rolls were developed and includes some beautiful images.

http://mentalfloss.com/article/61247/wwii-soldiers-31-rolls-film-are-finally-developed


You can check out the entire gallery on the project's website: http://www.rescuedfilm.com/#!rescuedwwii/c1d05

[Artful]

Some history there - thanks for posting

[Thumbcocker]

Some of those soldiers appear to be wearing jump boots; airborne?

[jmort]

Good stuff. Thanks

[xs11jack]

Thank you, I enjoy that kind of history. I like to see events through the eyes of the ordinary person that is involved in it.
Ole Jack

[mjwcaster]

Great history, great project, nice find.

I just need to learn not to read comments, people complaining about the video and not seeing all the photos.
There is a link in the description to the website gallery, with, you guessed it, all the pictures.

I thought the video about developing them was interesting, if I didn't I wouldn't bother watching it.
And it's amazing, but you can fast forward through the video if needed also.

When will I learn?

[MaryB]

Amazing cache of history! If we only knew the story behind each picture!

[Iowa Fox]

Amazing cache of history! If we only knew the story behind each picture!

For Sure!!

[scaevola]

Fascinating look back in time.

[MaLar]

I look at those photos and think most of those guys are gone today.
Some of the photos have the men washed out but the background is still visible.
I had uncles and friends who where vets from WW2. they are all gone now.
My Father was in Korea in the early fifty's he has been gone for seven years now.
I think of the things these men accomplished and the courage they must have had.
My gratiude for all vets can't be expressed.

[GREENCOUNTYPETE]

thank you for posting this.

[gpidaho]

I enjoyed that, thanks Doug

[bedbugbilly]

Doug - thanks for the post. I went to the site and those are some real interesting photos! It's a shame the story behind each one couldn't have been preserved as well. It would also be interesting to know "why" they never got developed. But then, maybe the fellow was so fed up with all he'd seen that he didn't want any reminders? We'll never know.

[DougGuy]

If these were posted where other vets could see them, they would say "That's xxxxx training center, I went through there in spring of '43 on the way to France." but the problem with that would be most of the people that could identify what the buildings and barracks are, and where they were, are gone too.. If you knew who this soldier was and had his service record, you could identify most if not all of the photos.

[flint45]

Very interesting story alot of my Dads film from WW2 did'nt make it back home.

[bullet maker 57]

Incredible piece of history. Thanks for posting.

[jonp]

I ran across a video of The Rescued Film Project some time ago and the images that they managed to save were stunning. I'd forgotten about them. Thanks for posting

[snuffy]

That video took me back a few years. While in secondary training at Shepard AFB, Wichita Falls Texas, I got involved in photography through a hobby shop operated by the photography guys at the base. You could bring your exposed B&W film in, develop it, then print it. The men that ran the hobby shop would help you get started, give advice and if asked critique your work. The only cost was for the paper for prints, and of course the films cost at the BX.

The guy in the video barely scratched the surface of what's involved with B&W film developing. Loading the film was a complete by feel process. You could practice with a dummy roll before going dark to see how it fits into the carrier or spool. I can certainly understand the excitement he must have had to see those images resurrected from so long ago.

My dad got me interested when I was 8 YO. He got me a Kodak brownie camera and some 126 vericrome pan B&W film. He had been an amateur photographer before moving to Wisconsin from northern Illinois. He had an enlarger and some really expensive cameras, did portraits for a lot of people. He still had the tanks and some chemicals, and some really old paper, but the enlarger had been sold. He showed me how to develop the film, then we tried to do some "contact prints", which worked, but were the size of the film format. So I had a head start when I went to the hobby shop.

Today the cell phones have a better camera in them than any of the old film cameras. Bigger digital cameras like my Cannon EOS rebel T2i can do some amazing stuff. The real beauty of it is you can shoot any number of pictures without worrying about running out of film! Probably less than 10% of pictures that are shot ever get printed. But those that do can be real gems.

[azrednek]

Very Cool !! THX

[CGT80]

That was cool. Those are the same as the tanks I have and used for processing 6x6 120 film for my Mamiya C3 twin lens camera. There was 12 exposures per roll and the camera had to be loaded and unloaded in a black bag. The quality from medium format is really a step above 35mm which I used a lot as well. I still have my cameras and enlargers (I used to develop and print both color and black and white at home) but I haven't shot film since the mid 2000's when I got my Sony Alpha digital SLR (to use my Minolta lenses). It isn't cheap to buy chemicals and paper, or film, and digital is free other than the initial camera and storage for your computer/archival dvds. In high school and college photo classes I had a reason to print, but afterwards there wasn't much of a point.

[Pumpkinheaver]

Wow those are neat.