Whippersnappers

Do you remember the first photos you took?

Whippersnappers is the first book to tell the history of children as photographers, from school societies in the 1880s, via post-war camera clubs and radical 1970s workshops, to the coming of digital cameras.

Annebella Pollen shows how photography was presented and promoted to children — by camera companies, comics, and teachers — and how the children themselves chose to use it. They include the girls whose trick photographs of the Cottingley Fairies fooled the nation; and the family given cameras and limitless film for a year by a national newspaper.

Tracing photography’s movement from elite pastime to accessible hobby, including a wealth of photos taken by children — of pets and friends, teachers and toys, fairies and ghosts — it presents a unique child’s-eye view of the world, seen through the camera.