J. P. Ball: Legendary African-American Photographer in Montana

Jeff Malcomson
Photograph Archives Manager
Montana Historical Society

Portrait of a music teacher, Helena,
ca.1887-1900 (Catalog # Lot 22 B8 F15 02)

From the unusual circumstance of being born to free black parents in 1825 Virginia, James Presley Ball lived a long life as a pioneering photographer and businessman.  Ball applied a portion of his pioneering spirit to his steady movement westward across the country, and another portion he applied to his early adoption and development of photographic skills and entrepreneurship.  Ball also pioneered as a social activist, using his photography for the advancement of African American rights and social and political acceptance.  [Ball’s intriguing life can be followed in an online exhibit created by the Cincinnati History Library and Archives where you can also browse or search nearly 300 of his photographs .

J. P. Ball arrived in Helena, Montana, late in life sometime in the fall of 1887, just two years before Montana achieved statehood.  He was an experienced and successful photographer, having worked decades since 1845 in Cincinnati, Ohio, Minneapolis, Minnesota, and many other locations.  He strongly supported the abolition of slavery prior to the Civil War, and in the years following it he continued to promote the political and social advancement of African Americans.  His son, J. P. Ball, Jr. came to Helena with him, sharing his father’s political views and his father’s business, a photography studio then known as J. P. Ball and Son.  J. P. Ball Jr. published and edited a short-lived newspaper in Helena called The Colored Citizen, while his father remained active in the Republican Party and at one time served as president of the Afro-American Club, a state-wide support group for the black community in Montana.  Ball saw the Montana Territory become a state in 1889, Helena become the state capital in 1894, and he photographed the laying of the cornerstone for the Montana State Capitol building in 1899.  Ball followed his son to Seattle in 1900 and died in 1904.

Ball photographed a series of views from the ceremony to lay the cornerstone of the Montana State Capitol building in Helena on the 4^th of July 1899 (Catalog # 957-627).

Though very little of his written record remains in Montana, Ball’s photographic legacy in the Treasure State is preserved through over 100 known Ball photographs in the collections of the Montana Historical Society Photograph Archives. He was first and foremost a master of studio portraiture; most of his extant work is individual studio portraits. Ball served all members of the Helena community, taking portraits of a U. S. Senator, a Chinese cook, an immigrant family fresh from Europe, and many other Helenans, both white and black. However, he occasionally took his camera outside to photograph significant events. His work documenting two public executions in Helena in 1896 is some of the most intriguing work by any photographer in 19^th century Montana. We recently digitized over twenty of Ball’s more interesting photos. These can be browsed here on the Montana Memory Project. Several select images are displayed below.

Portrait of 'Tex' Rose, the long-time caretaker
at the Broadwater Hotel in Helena,
ca. 1891-1900 (Catalog # 957-598)

Portrait of an unidentified man, ca.1887-1900
(Catalog # 957-602)

Portrait of William Biggerstaff, a convicted
murderer, prior to his public hanging,
April 1896 (Catalog # 957-610)

Portrait of the body of William Biggerstaff, after his public hanging, April 1896 (Catalog # 957-613). For Ball’s images of his public execution and that of William Gay see the photos on the Montana Memory Project link above.

Happy Valentine's Day , Love Charlie

Jennifer Bottomly-O'looney
Senior Curator
Montana Historical Society

My Valentine by Charles M. Russell
watercolor and gouache, ca. 1896-1897, 18” H x 15½” W
Historical Society Collection, Gift of Mrs. Charles L. Sheridan in memory of Lela V. Roberts, X1954.03.03

In My Valentine the artist surrounds the beautiful central figure with a decidedly Russell-esque sinuous, heart-shaped frame and places two putti floating next to her.

After a courtship of just over one-year Charlie and Nancy Russell—whom Charlie called Mame or Mamie—were married on September 9, 1896, in a ceremony at the home of their good friends Ben and Lela Roberts. It was in the Roberts’s home in Cascade where Russell had first met Nancy the year before. The bride wore a blue wedding dress that Lela Roberts made for her.  The event was newsworthy. As the Anaconda Standard on reported on September 13:

“Wednesday evening at the residence of Mr. and Mrs. B. R. Roberts, Miss Mamie Mann and Charles M. Russell were united in marriage by Rev. B. W. Pierce. Many guests were present and after the ceremony the party sat down to an elaborate collation. The occasion was one of the most pleasant social events ever held in Cascade where the couple have many friends.” The Standard noted that “Charley Russell, the happy groom, is known all over the west as the ‘Cowboy Artist’… [and] now more than ever before [he] will confine himself to his profession. In the classic language of Charley, he’s ‘done settled down to business and can’t trot with the gang anymore.’”

The couple honeymooned in the small twelve by twenty-four-foot shack behind the Robert’s house, where they would make their first home.

Charlie was persuaded to paint this very atypical, and romantic watercolor, My Valentine, for his friend Lela, who used it as a sign for a candy booth set up as a fund-raiser for a church social in Cascade. It was given to the Montana Historical Societyin 1954 in memory of the donor’s mother, Lela V. Roberts.