James Conway Farley photograph of William Custalo
Content Description
This collection contains an albumen photograph cabinet card of William Custalo, a successful Richmond-area businessman and proprietor of the Custalo House bar and restaurant. Custalo is captured in a suit with a watch chain, seated with his hand resting on a wicker chair. The portrait features the imprint of the Jefferson Fine Art Gallery, Richmond, Virginia. The photograph was taken by James Conway Farley, one of the earliest successful Black photographers in the United States. Born to enslaved parents in Prince Edward County, Virginia in 1854, Farley moved to Richmond and entered the photography trade, eventually opening his own studio, the Jefferson Fine Art Gallery, in 1895. Beforehand, Farley spent twenty years working for the G.W. Davis Photography Gallery. The Jefferson Fine Art Gallery studio served a racially mixed clientele base. Farley’s Richmond studio had closed by 1907, dating the photograph of William Custalo from circa 1895 to 1907. Farley is last recorded as a photographer in Jersey City, New Jersey on the 1910 census.
Acquisition Type
Purchase
Provenance
Purchased from Max Rambod, 4 March 2026.
Language of Description
English
Script of Description
Latin
Restrictions Apply
No
Dates
- Creation: c. 1895-1907
Creator
- Farley, James Conway, 1854-1912 (Person)
Full Extent
0.03 Cubic Feet (One letter-size file folder)
Language of Materials
English
Metadata Rights Declarations
- License: This record is made available under an Universal 1.0 Public Domain Dedication Creative Commons license. The Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library of the University of Virginia makes its bibliographic records and the metadata contained therein available for public use under the CC0 1.0 Public Domain Designation.
Inventory
One photograph
Source
- Max Rambod (Organization)
Subject
- Custalo, William, 1840-1907 (Person)
- Jefferson Fine Art Gallery (Richmond, Virginia) (Organization)