Another Trip to Storage

Today I'm running more stuff over to storage in Detroit.  My goal is to reduce the glacial till here in Grand Haven in order to simplify my eventual move north — someday.  To this end I have taken load after load to the UPS Store in downtown Grand Haven to have it packed in peanuts.  As I told the young lady yesterday, when my move is complete I'll have enough boxes and peanuts to handle my shipping needs for the next couple decades.

Today's haul includes my parents' wedding photos.  We found these in storage in Florida after my mother passed away, along with my mother's and grandmother's wedding dresses.  Some of you at St. John's saw these black-and-white photos, taken in Doylestown, PA, in October 1941 by a Bachrach photographer.  They are very handsome.  In fact, my parents look almost too young to be getting hitched!  A few weeks ago The Frame and Mat Shop framed the two photos very effectively, and they will be on display — someday — up north.

As we were leaving Florida at the end of that last trip my brother Bob decided to have his photos scanned so he could mount them on his personal web site.  The local photocopy emporium refused because we could not produce copyright clearance.  Bob later called the Bachrach studio in Philadelphia.  They said they would be happy to make copies (which Bob didn't want) but would not give copyright clearance for use of these images on his web site.  Is this common practice?  Couples getting married — or more likely their parents! — drop major cash for high-quality wedding photos.  Does that investment not give the couple the right to post their own photos on the web?  If not, what have they really paid for?  This morning I found the web site for the original Bachrach's great-grandson, who is a photographer in Boston.  I think I'll send him a tart note. •••