Elsie Holloway

Elizabeth-Mary “Elsie” Holloway was born in St. John's in 1882.[2] She was the daughter of Henrietta Palfrey and Robert E. Holloway.[3] Her father was a college professor and amateur landscape photographer who introduced his two children, Bert and Elsie, to photography.[4]

In the early 1900s, after their father's death, Elsie and Bert established the Holloway Studio in St. John's, which was among the first portrait studios in Newfoundland.[4][2] Bert specialized in landscapes and Elsie specialized in portraits.[4]

In 1915 Bert enlisted for service in World War I and died at the battle of Monchy-le-Preux in 1917.[4]

Holloway's photograph of Captain John Alcock stowing provisions aboard Vickers Vimy aircraft before its trans-Atlantic flight on 14 June 1919

Elsie, meanwhile made portraits of many of the Newfoundland Regiment enlistees in St. John's.[4]

After the war, Holloway kept the studio open, and continued to create portraits and landscape photographs.[1] Notably, she photographed Alcock and Brown in 1919 before their successful Trans-Atlantic crossing, and Amelia Earhart's 1932 flight from Harbour Grace, where Earhart began her solo transatlantic flight.[2][5]

In 1946 Holloway retired and sold her studio.[4] She died in 1971 in St. John's.[1] Regrettably, many of Holloway's glass negatives were stripped of their emulsion and used to build a greenhouse.[6]

• With the Camera: The Life of Elsie Holloway Newfoundland and Labrador Heritage video