Paterson-George Collection

A well known collection of train photographs originally by Al Paterson and Dick George. The photos are now part of Canada's National Train archive at Exporail (CHRA).

On 2013-07-09, at 8:35, Peter Murphy wrote:

Dear Mr. Meredith,

Thanks for your e mail.

When the Al Paterson negative collection was donated and ownership transferred to the CRHA Mrs. Ruth Paterson, his legal guardian transferred the title and copyright; this would apply only to the negatives actually taken by Al, or those of collections he purchased. We all know that Al made many copy negatives from numerous sources, as well he purchased several negative collections; from our observations when sorting, initial cataloguing and packing, it will be difficult to make an exact determination as to what was actually taken by Al, and others; the negative envelopes are not marked with the source of the image. Of course it can be narrowed down by era, negative size, and the like, but this is inaccurate at best. Furthermore thousands of prints from his images are 'out there' as Al sold at train shows and was most generous when solicited for photographs for books, magazines, etc. we don't see copyright as a major issue of any kind.

The collection is extensive and our initial objective is to identify and re-integrate the hundreds of loose negatives into the filing system. Eventually the negatives will be catalogued and sometime in the distant future we intend to have a selection of images available on-line; this is as usual subject to available funding to do the job. In the meantime we do have a subject catalogue and have been successful in locating images for two projects so far! Our primary concern was to save the collection intact to preserve for future generations, this we have done. Right now the collection may be accessed in person at the CRHA Archives by appointment. One may also contact our Archivist Josee Vallerand for image information if you can provide the necessary information (railway, engine number, etc.); because of the filing method, it's nearly impossible to search by geographic location.

In a future issue of Canadian Rail (within the next year or so) we will feature an article on Al Paterson and his photography. We hope to meet with Ruth and Al this fall to get Al's story, we also plan to contact some of his long-time associates to fill in the blanks. We had hoped to do this when we packed up the collection but didn't have time (3 of us worked 3 days at his home). Thanks for your interest, Al's collection is intact and stored in a controlled environment.

Peter Murphy, V. P. CRHA