A group of women gather at center of road in their village while a man fishes on a small dock at far right. Some of the homes at left have thatched roofs. Most likely taken in Germany, this photograph was published in several photographic journals from 1901-02.

Walter Bartels: 1868-1927

Amateur photographer Walter Bartels was from Gütersloh, Germany. His father Ferdinand Bartels (1834-1905) and uncle Wilhelm Bartels (1818-1892) had established a silk factory in Gütersloh in 1856, and with it, the means of financial success for the Bartels family. While brothers Hermann and Martin went on to be a pastor and doctor respectively, Walter became a bank director (1.) beginning in 1905 and a serious amateur photographer before this time.

Bartels photographs were published internationally in the very early 20th Century, including in the pages of The Photographische Mitteilungen in Germany and Photographic Times in New York. As late as 1908, he is mentioned as receiving a silver medal in an exhibition held in Essen by The Association of Rhenish-Westphalian Amateur Photographers. (2.) Bartels also exhibited the same year in a show put on by the Vienna Camera Club. (Wiener Photoklub) 

• 1. Walter Bartels: Deutsches Geschlecterbuch: Vol. 37: 1922: Bernhard Koerner, p. 163; Gütersloh City Archives. 
• 2.  Apollo: Centralorgan für Amateur- und Fachphotographie: 1908: #308: pp. 89, 96.