Shared Photo: Thomas Foster and Margaret Wark

Question

This picture is of Margaret Wark and Thomas Foster my husband's 2 X grt grandparents. It  was provided by the nephew or maybe grand nephew, (we aren't quite sure) of Margaret Wark

It looks like it has been cut out of a larger photo and then put on a white background and photographed, or maybe photo copied. They married in 1867, this may have been an engagement photo. They were both about 28 years old when they married. 

 Location: Renfrew County,. Date: 1867.

Click here for the image details page or here for the full-sized version (2254 x 2823).

Answer 1

M, thank you for posting this photo. My 2x great grandfather, Alexander Wark came from Paisley, Renfrewshire.

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Wark-394

Do you supposed that they could have been related?

Answer 2

Sorry Marion, perhaps several generations before, Thomas was born in Canada, his father was born in county Wicklow, Ireland, Margaret was born in Ireland.

They lived in Renfrew County, Ontario, Canada.

Comments

Hello M,

Do you think the Renfrew County, Ontario, was named after Renfrewshire in Scotland?

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Possibly, though it had other names before, originally it was called Horton.

Many of my husband's maternal grandmother's family were early settlers in the area. They were Scots and Irish, some arrived pre 1840 just after the area was opened for settlement.

This might help.

https://www.renfrew.ca/history-of-renfrew.cfm

https://sites.rootsweb.com/~onrenfre/history.html

Answer 3

Thank You for sharing!  I checked my connection and it was only through marriages!  I love the photo!  It speaks volumes of the time and styles!

Comments

Hello Cousin David,

Photos reveal secrets if you know how to read them.

You also can tell lots of information about the people in the photo. You can tell that they were alive at the time of the photo. If you know their demographic dates, you can date the photo. You can tell about how old they were at the time and this will narrow down the photo's date even further.

You can tell what race they were. In Europe this does not matter as much as it would in the Caribbean, where so many people are biracial. The race of the people in the photo can be used to rule out ancestry of people of a predominantly different racial makeup.

You can tell where a photo was taken if another photo with the same people and background has been dated.

One time I enlarged a photo of a cousin and I saw a wedding ring on his finger that I would not have seen if I had viewed the photo at actual size. This helped to date the photo. I knew it was taken after his wedding.

Answer 4

Nice photo of Thomas & Margaret M. Thank you for sharing it with us. Not sure if it was cut out from another print as the edges appear too precise. I don't see any signs of cutting with a sharp object.

Comments

Several years ago we visited the Pembroke,  Ontario Archives, with permission I took a photo of the picture the archives had in their collection.

The picture had obviously been cut out of a larger photo somewhat carefully with a small pair of scissors. There was no background to the photo, which there would have been as it is obviously a studio photo.

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The white background makes it looks obvious. On second look, the head and neck areas are not cut as well as other areas.