Sepia Saturday provides bloggers with an opportunity to share their history through the medium of photographs. Historical photographs of any age or kind (they don’t have to be sepia) become the launchpad for explorations of family history, local history and social history in fact or fiction, poetry or prose, words or further images.

The prompt image is from the collection of Alan Burnett, and that is his Auntie Miriam enjoying the seaside sands. The style of Auntie Miriam’s swimsuit reminded me of a swimsuit in a collection of pictures from my husband’s family.

The youngster featured in these photos is my husband’s father, Martin. I think the man in the car is Martin’s father, Simone Morales.

Martin is looking a little camera shy below. I’m guessing he was about three years old. What do you think? That would date the photo around 1928.

I thought this was a picture of Martin enjoying the water. But once I saw it blown up, I wasn’t sure.

Fun at last!

And I have to add one more… just so you can see that he had hair under that swim cap.

Everyone tells me that Martin’s mother “dyed his hair” when he was young. Pictures of him as a little boy show him with blonde curls. As an older boy and man, Martin had very dark hair – true to his Sicilian roots.

I asked my mother-in-law about the picture above and she couldn’t identify the little girl. She said that Lena Morales Maida (Martin’s aunt – sister of Simone) had a bay house on Bolivar (Bolivar Peninsula, Texas) and this was the likely location for these photographs. The last picture was probably taken on a separate trip to the beach.

Bolivar Peninsula - Photo Credit: Dan M.S. | U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Digital Visual Library

The Bolivar Peninsula was hit hard by Hurricane Ike in 2008. I was going to include a photo of the destruction, but decided to leave us with thoughts of a beautiful sunny day at the beach.

For more sunny beaches, swim over to Sepia Saturday to see what others have created for today’s prompt.