While faculty from the Department of Botany explored the state to identify plant life in the early 1900s, department photographer C.J. Hibbard not only provided photographic documentation of their observations, but also took the opportunity to explore a bit of his creative side in the process. As we previously shared, alongside his botanical portraits, Hibbard also occasionally took stylized photographs of people subtly inserted into landscape compositions. Within the 2,229 images present in the photograph collection of the Department of Botany we found another subject that interested Hibbard: hats. Whether they were part of the composition to provide a sense of scale, or he was just shooting on particularly windy days, hats appear in random photographs throughout the collection.

Can you find the hat?
(click on the image for a larger version)

– Field of mosses and lichens, Grand Marais, July 7, 1902

– Old shore line, Grand Marais, July 22, 1902

– Cladonia rangiferina, Grand Marais, July 30, 1902

– Cladonia rangiferina and talus, Grand Marais, July 30, 1902

– Dwarf pine tree on top of Mount Josephine, Grand Portage, August 13, 1902

– Umbilicaria muhlenbergii, Grand Portage, August 1902