I absolutely love everything about this photo! William is so well dressed and ready for his photo. Looks like his best friend needed to be in the photograph too.
It appears the name is William Rothery, but I am open to other suggestions. I have found a few William Rotherys: one in Los Angeles, California (born in England), and another in Virginia.
I need your help with this one. What does the name look like to you? What year is the Model T? What age do you think William is in this photo?
Would love to see this photograph make its way back to a family member.
This photo is part of a large collection of photos with the surnames Flansburg and McAfee. View more from this collection here.
This is the closest I can get to the car (if you use the slideshow arrows to the right on the page you get to you’ll see a pic of the back of it) but it’s not exact.
http://topclassiccarsforsale.com/ford/300352-1924-ford-model-t-sedan-4-cylinder-gasoline-2-spd-manual-engine-runs-well-kansas.html
This model is 1924 (but the one in your photo doesn’t look like a new car.) The boy looks about seven to me. Best way to check is, if you can find out what the dog is, try to find a children’s average height chart for each year of growth and compare it to the height of the dog.
I think you’re right that the spelling is Rothery. I’d thought the penultimate letter might have been an ‘s’ but considering how the h has been written in the upper version (almost backwards!) I reckon the ‘r’ has suffered a similar fate. It doesn’t look like England – wrong look to the street and houses and, aside from anything else, we drive on the left here so parked cars usually face the other way. 🙂
I’d suggest looking at some vintage photos of Californian and Virginian streets and see if you can spot the type of architecture. Also have a look at boys’ clothing from the 1920s and 1930s. The third pic down in this post looks similar: https://witness2fashion.wordpress.com/tag/boys-suits-with-vest-1925-1926-1920s/
My guess for date is 1924 to 1928. Probably not later as it will then be getting into the Depression and this kid is very well dressed. Just a possibility it might be earlier than 20s but I doubt it.