About

3 inches; photographic.
14 gelatin silver prints, contact sheets
80 dated and undated negatives

Collection Description

A. B. Bell, Sr., a professional photographer and newspaper man, was born in 1914 in Tyler, Texas. He was raised there and attended Emmett Scott High School. Bell moved to Dallas, Texas about 1946 and worked at Sears, Roebuck and Co. and attended the Sears trade school in photography.

Bell spent most of his career working for African American-owned newspapers. He began as a photographer and circulation employee for the Dallas Express about 1950 and joined the Dallas Star-Post, renamed the Dallas Post-Tribune in 1952. He also worked for seven years as a district manager for the Dallas Morning News. In addition to his newspaper work he did free-lance photography in South Dallas's African American community for over 30 years. A. B. Bell died June 2, 1989.

A. B. Bell was married to Cathryn Chism in 1946 and they had four children. He was a member of St. John Missionary Baptist Church in Dallas and was a Master Mason with the Paul Drayton Lodge, Prince Hall Masons. Examples of his work appear in Portraits of Community: African American Photography in Texas (Austin: Texas State Historical Association, 1996).

The collection consists of selected examples of Bell's commercial photography, made between 1959 and 1968. He primarily worked in Dallas, Seagoville, and Oak Cliff. Modern photographic prints and original negatives document African American business, religion, parades, news events, and community life in Dallas, Texas. The bulk of the photographer's work remains in family hands.

Arrangement: prints and negatives arranged by series and chronologically.

Copyright and permissions: use in educational research and publication only. Permission from TAAP Archive required.

Source: A. B. Bell

See also: Dallas Post-Tribune Photograph Collection