More History at Home from the Chestnut Hill Conservancy-Try the Photo Archives

Community stories from our past, in the comfort of your home

We hope you are doing well. To enrich our minds and spirits during this strange time, the Conservancy is sending out new activities by email every couple of days.

These activities – architectural coloring book pages, narrated slideshows, activites from partners & friends, and more – are collected on our HISTORY AT HOME webpage!

Today’s installment offers a guide to taking a socially distant stroll through history in the online image collections of the Chestnut Hill Conservancy.

Find a photo of your house, a favorite store long gone, or a local landmark by using the PHOTO SEARCH function on the Conservancy’s Archives page.

Once you have navigated to this page, you will be shown the Archives online collections home page, which has a series of options listed.

The best way to review the collections is to use the “keyword search” function. Enter words you want to search. To enter phrases, wrap them in quotes, for example, “Cresheim Creek”. Your results should look like THIS >>>

To further refine the research results, click the “items with images only” box and search again.

You can order photographs using this website as well:

Once you have found a photograph you want, click on the thumbnail of the image you want to order. This will show you a larger image and associated information.
Click on this larger image; you will then see an even larger image, with a camera icon and “request image.”
To order an image, click on this icon, and then fill out the form. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to email our Archivist, Alex Bartlett, at Alex@chconservancy.org. He will respond to you as quickly as he can.

Have fun, stay healthy, and keep in touch!