The first ever photograph of a ukulele, being played by...

Just reading the wonderful Alice in Sunderland, which includes this photograph of three English girls taken in the Summer of 1858 playing machetes, the Madeiran predecessors of ukuleles (legend has it that three Madeiran carpenters went to Hawaii in 1879 and started making tiny four stringed guitars). Anyway, the photograph is the first time anyone took a picture of a machete or a ukulele, and the girl on the left? Alice Liddell, Lewis Carroll's inspiration for Alice in Wonderland...

Posted by Tom Whitwell.

Comments:

...and in other ties between the world of nineteenth century literature and the music of elsewhere, it is thought that the character "Henry Jekyll" was based on Robert Louis Stevens' acquaintance Walter Jekyll, author of the first book about music and folklore in Jamaica.

# posted by

danjo : 3:23 pm

those girls are totally Steampunk!!!!

# posted by

Other People : 8:19 pm

the machete - surely a precursor to the axe?

# posted by

Anonymous : 11:23 pm

'the machete - surely a precursor to the axe?'
nice one! That made me laugh...

# posted by

Anonymous : 8:11 pm

The photo is not only of Lewis Carroll's inspiration; it's taken BY Lewis Carroll (C. L. Dodgson)

# posted by

Anonymous : 10:21 pm