About

6 cubic feet; photographic, printed.
200 gelatin silver prints approx.
100 color prints approx.
1200 film negatives approx.
Printed material.

Collection Description

Elnora Williams Frazier, a commercial and community photographer, was born January 10, 1924, in the Fifth Ward of Houston, Texas. Raised in Houston’s Second Ward, Frazier was educated in Houston schools and attended Houston Negro College. After high school, in 1942, Frazier attended the Teal School of Photography, taught by A. C. Teal of Houston, eventually becoming employed by Teal for fifteen years.

Elnora Frazier left the Teal Studio after A.C. Teal’s death in 1956. During the late 1950s and through the 1960s and 1970s Frazier worked in Houston for Courtesy Photo Supply, where she did black and white finishing. During the 1960s she also worked for Floyd Photo. In 1982, she began work for National Photographic Labs as a printer until her retirement in 1989. During her professional career Frazier also performed privately contracted work for friends and family. Elnora Frazier married Marshall Frazier in 1948 and had one daughter, Marsha, born in 1951. An oral history with Frazier and examples of her work appear in Portraits of Community: African American Photography in Texas (Austin: Texas State Historical Association, 1996).

The collection consists primarily of Frazier’s portraiture work and includes informal snapshots of family, friends, and events. Several examples of handtinting are also included. Studio proofs and machine prints comprise most of the prints, which match only about a quarter of the negatives. Negatives are in 4x5 and 120 formats. One folder contains prints from the A.C. Teal Studio of Houston. The collection also contains two class photographs of students of the Teal School of Photography.

Arrangement: prints arranged by subject; negatives arranged alphanumerically.

Source: donated by Elnora W. Frazier

See also: Oral History Collection