Flood of a Century

Young Albert Zintsmaster was in the right place at a bad time when he photographed this impressive natural disaster—a photo that helped establish his photography studio's reputation.

On February 28, 1910, a major part of Herkimer County in New York State was inundated. The first floors of houses were flooded, and streets were navigable only by boat.

Though only nineteen, Albert P. Zintsmaster (1880–after 1920) took a photograph that describes the condition of the town as well as the ability and determination of the photographer to record the disaster. A similar Zintsmaster photograph was published in the Utica, New York, Observer-Dispatch.

It is an image both newsworthy and promotional, suggesting that the Zintsmaster Studio, which eventually grew to include Albert's nephew Daniel and his son Max, was available for every occasion requiring a photograph. It remained in business under the name Zintsmaster until 1945.

Source: Merry A. Foresta. American Photographs: The First Century (Washington, D.C.: National Museum of American Art with the Smithsonian Institution Press, 1996).

Pictured: Zintsmaster Studio, 1885–1945, Flood, Herkimer, New York, 1910, silver print on paper, 7 7/8 x 9 5/8 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase from the Charles Isaacs Collection made possible in part by the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment.