Loving: A Photographic History of Men in Love 1850s-1950s

by Hugh Nini, Neal Treadwell

Loving: A Photographic History of Men in Love, 1850-1950 portrays the history of romantic love between men in hundreds of moving and tender vernacular photographs taken between the years 1850 and 1950. This visual narrative of astonishing sensitivity brings to light an until-now-unpublished collection of hundreds of snapshots, portraits, and group photos taken in the most varied of contexts, both private and public.

Taken when male partnerships were often illegal, the photos here were found at flea markets, in shoe boxes, family archives, old suitcases, and later online and at auctions. The collection now includes photos from all over the world: Australia, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, France, Germany, Japan, Greece, Latvia, the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, and Serbia. The subjects were identified as couples by that unmistakable look in the eyes of two people in love - impossible to manufacture or hide. They were also recognized by body language - evidence as subtle as one hand barely grazing another - and by inscriptions, often coded.

Included here are ambrotypes, daguerreotypes, glass negatives, tin types, cabinet cards, photo postcards, photo strips, photomatics, and snapshots - over 100 years of social history and the development of photography.

In these delight-filled pages, couples in love tell their own story for the first time at a time when joy and hope - indeed human connectivity - are crucial lifelines to our better selves. Universal in reach and overwhelming in impact, Loving speaks to our spirit and resilience, our capacity for bliss, and our longing for the shared truths of love.

Genres: Nonfiction, LGBT, History, Photography, Art, Queer, Gay

336 pages, Hardcover

First published October 14, 2020

About the author

Hugh Nini was born in Beaumont, TX, in 1955, the second of seven children. He grew up in Houston, TX, and later owned and operated a ballet school, the Denton Ballet Academy, for thirty-three years before moving to New York City in 2012. Though ballet is his greatest love and chosen career, his first love was the French Horn, where he enjoyed great success as Principal Horn in the UNT Symphony under the direction of Anshel Brusilow. After leaving classical music behind and turning his full attention to ballet, his students immediately, and consistently, began achieving success on both national and international levels. Beginning in 1988 he founded, and served as Artistic Director for twenty-five years, the Festival Ballet of North Central Texas. In addition to the more than 30 repertory ballets, Nini has choreographed two full length ballets; The Snow Queen and The Nutcracker. His production of The Nutcracker was among sixteen other ballet companies' Nutcrackers to compete in the Dallas Dance Council's "Best Nutcracker" competition. It swept the awards with thirteen out of sixteen "Bests" including Best Nutcracker.

Currently, he works as a private ballet coach in Manhattan and is on the faculty of the Joffrey Ballet. In his spare time he enjoyed showing his, and his husband's, Irish Setters at AKC dog shows and at the Irish Setter Club of America's National Specialty. Post championships and their showing days, their red heads, Ryan, Scarlet, Streeter, and Reba, served full time sofa surfers at home in Dallas. Hugh considers his wonderful husband to be the second luckiest guy in the world. Meeting, falling in love with, and marrying Neal, makes him the luckiest guy in the world.

In the late 1990's Hugh and Neal started collecting photographs purely by accident.  The first photograph came from an antique store in Dallas.  The photograph was of two men in a loving embrace mixed within random photos of a Dallas neighborhood from the 1920s.  Our collection of over 2800 vintage photos of romantic couples spanning the 100 years between the 1850s and 1950s is the basis for our book.

Reviews

[♣ Irish Smurfétté ♣ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gorgeous, in content and production...

What an important document this is, reflecting the comfort, silliness, and intimacy that come with love.

There is an extensive introduction, more than 20 pages long, and it's a concise yet jam packed study all on its own.

We have professionally posed images, purposeful yet relaxed occasions, and engaging photo booths full of goofiness and tender smiles.

The book itself is beautifully and substantially bound, with matte heavy duty pages sharing and preserving these meaningful and relatable moments.

What a treasure. Loving, indeed. <3

[NicoleR.M.M. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I kind of became obsessed with this book. There's a reason behind that obsession.
If I look at this collection of photographs, it moves me to see how these men for decades tried to find ways to demonstrate their queer love, to find a way for their love to last beyond time and place. A document to proof they existed, as did their love, even when it was in a time that it wasn't supposed to exist, when it was considered a crime for one man to love another man. Men have died for a love like that. Men have suffered because of it. And yet these men wanted their love to be portrayed, an eternal lasting document of who they were and who they loved.

This is an important collection for a variety of reasons. It's interesting to see how photography developed from the earliest photographs into the 1950's. The composition of the photo's, the quality. It's interesting to see the history of the way men dressed. Their clothes, their haircuts.
And I also believe it's an important documentary for gay men everywhere, past and future. These photo's have something to show, meaningly: this love is valid, we see you. It's a love that's beautiful on it's own, and it's a love that's valuable, no matter what society tried and tries to tell you. It's pure, it's allowed.

I'm the daughter of a deeply closeted gay man. My father had only one life to live and he was forced to live it being untrue to himself. Forced into a marriage by the outside world - parents, family expectations, narrow minded small villagers - forced to hide himself and find consolation through secret, obscure meetings with other men. It may sound strange to others, but I almost wished for one of such photo's from my father. It would have been comforting to know that he had found love, even if it had to have been in secret. But just to know he did have some happy moments, would be a consolation on its own.
I'll never know if he had those, but looking at this book, at these men who had the courage to have themselves photographed, I can not keep myself from hoping that somewhere in this world, somewhere hidden in a shoebox or a closet, a photo like that exists.

I want to thank the collectors of these photo's - Hugh Nini and Neal Treadwell - for publishing this book. It's a beautiful reflection of queer love throughout the years and therefore an important document. I hope they keep on looking for more photo's like this, and maybe even be able to turn it into a second book over time.

[~Nicole~ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Santa was kind to me this year leaving this book under my Christmas tree and making me incredibly happy. I don’t think there are enough proper words to describe this book, it’s like a time machine, a gut-wrenching time machine. Beautiful, just beautiful and heartbreaking and hopeful at the same time and it made me smile through my tears.
Hats off to the two authors and a big thank you. 🙏

[Jason · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a beautiful book. Definitely one I will return to again and again.

[Ben Howard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loving is something really special. To get a snapshot into the lives of these men, just a moment of bliss shared with one another. It's a beautiful collection of images men in love.

The forwards, especially "An Accidental Collection" by the author's Hugh Nini and Neal Treadwell, were great reads and gave excellent context to the photographs.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

These guys are truly, undoubtedly, assuredly, indubitably, undeniably, definitely, unmistakably, in love. Pictures like this remind us that queer love has always been here. It gives the reader a warm heart to see each couples' sincerity. You can see that hint of magic in their eyes.

We can only hope they somehow were able to stay together. These pictures were taken when selfies were tough, so you needed friends (or maybe a mirror). And being caught with these pictures could bring the couple to criminal proceedings.

Most of the pictures dominate the 9" x 12" format. I'm not sure why some of them went to 9 pictures on a 3x3 grid on a page, when they look to have at least gone to 2x2 grid. Maybe blowing them up too much yielded graininess. However, there were actually 47 pages in this book that were 100% white (including 11 double-sided full-white). Why? Were there pictures removed last-minute as it went to press? The quality of these pictures is fantastic!

I wish each picture date/credit was actually put RIGHT WITH the picture, rather than in an appendix in the back. I want a single line of text containing the brief material in the back, directly underneath each picture. I subtract a half star for making me seek dates in the appendix, and also for all the blank white pages in the book.

6* for the pictures[yes, 6] (but -0.5* book layout issues) = still rounds to 5*

[Dana Sweeney · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is such a moving and important photographic collection. These photographs were assembled over the course of decades, primarily from old photos that the collectors (Hugh Nini and Neal Treadwell) found jumbled in flea market bins across the United States, Canada, Australia, and most of Europe. The care in their curation and preservation are plain to see, and a gift to readers. I’m so glad this collection exists to recover and expand the queer historical record between 1850 and 1950.

Turning through the pages of this book was a surprisingly emotional experience. As the photos were nearly all found discarded by Nini and Treadwell without context, the people shown within them are anonymous. There are no captions. No names. No year. No certainty of place. No knowledge of how these men came together, or what will become of them. No narrative. The images feel, for this reason, fleeting and ephemeral. And yet: the purpose of taking these photographs for their subjects was, presumably, permanence. To document, and by documentation prove, the existence of something that was not supposed to: queer love and intimacy.

Even beyond the striking subjects of the photographs, this is a gorgeous record of the first century of photography. The composition of the photographs, the production quality, the cameras involved — the visual artistry and breadth of technique drew my attention as well as the indelible couples captured. It’s amazing that these photographs exist, and breathtaking to see the experiments in form and approach that people took to photograph a dangerous kind of love.

My one sore wish is that the book had done more to include greater racial diversity — there is a lot of need for improvement in the collection. Nearly all (not all, but nearly all) of the men in the book are white. I understand that there is a mountain of history that produced vast, racist gaps in the overall photographic record. I understand that finding these photos, as needles in haystacks, is difficult and time consuming and largely down to luck. Still. As I (a queer white man) moved through the book, part of the emotive experience was seeing images that recover something precious from historical erasure. In a book that resists historical erasure in such important ways, the large absence of people of color feels conspicuously like its own kind of erasure. I wish it were better, but must note the incompletion.

Overall, for what it is: I do think this is a really special collection. The range of emotions and dispositions captured — playful, smitten, intimate, defiant, cozy, sexy, proud, graceful, stoic, private, public, pastoral — was beautiful. I am very appreciative of the curatorial work that went into this collection and am so glad to have these photographs.

[Joy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Saklanmaya mahkum aşklar, bir flaşın ışığında çıkmış gün yüzüne, siz asker arkadaşları çektiğinizi sanarken mesela, tarihe not düşmüşsünüz haberiniz yok. Gözleri ışıl ışıl hepsinin. Ah ne güzel anılar okudum ben bu fotoğraflar ile anlatamam.

[Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a beautiful collection of photos and wonderful to browse. I only take issue with the collectors describing the collection as "universal". Like so much of queer culture, the collection offers on a slice of man-man love (an almost exclusively white slice) and calls it universal. The essay supporting interpretation of the collection is missing an important analysis of: who is missing? And why?

[All My Friends Are Fictional · Rating 3 out of 5]

All great and fun, but on the whole, this compilation is extremely one-dimensional. And if you take a look at the authors, you realize that they basically were collecting pictures that mirrored them as a couple.

[Rick · Rating 5 out of 5]

I got this as a birthday gift for myself. Since I’d first heard of this volume’s pending publication, I was intrigued and fascinated with the tantalizing images that reviews and advertisements were teasing me with. I knew I wanted it. I thought about waiting for a “publisher’s overstock” sale, but once I saw it in a bookstore, I knew I had to support the very concept of this type of collection. And I’m glad I did. Yes, this book is expensive. But it is printed on high quality paper and with a solid, durable binding. But really it is the subject matter of the photographs that is the real treasure. In their introduction, Nini & Treadwell, the collectors, outline the parameters for what type of photos they had decided to collect and what they have decided to include from their collection in this volume. And I have to admit that of their criteria are aspects that had occurred to me as I was contemplating those prepublication photos that I saw. All but one criteria that is. They did not mention a scenario of how SOME of these photos could have been taken that seems very plausible, at least to me. Please, do not take this the wrong way, I’m thinking that only a small handful of some of the earliest photos in this collection MIGHT possibly have been created under these conditions. In the early days of photography, it was not uncommon for photographers to either hire or get volunteers to pose for pictures. In these incidents, the subjects may never have even had their photograph taken before, it could quite literally be the first time in their life that they had even considered the thought of their picture being taken. And the thought that the result of this “picture taking” pose could outlive them by, potentially, a hundred years or more would have been inconceivable. Today, this is a frame of mind, a perspective that we can not even begin to grasp. Today we take photos with out phones or cameras without giving it a second thought. We chronicle our lives in photos in the assumption that this completely normal and has likely always been and always will be. But that is not the reality of the era from which these photos were taken. The photographer may have been the one who “posed” the subjects. They may have had little or no input or contribution to what was being photographed, other than that they were present. Again, if something like this scenario is represented among these photographs, it is certainly a very, very small number. I just feel that possibility should be recognized for what it is: a possibility. But beyond that, the vast majority of these photographs are magnificent and beautifully reproduced. I was even enormously pleased to see the scratches, flaws, imperfections and stains-of-age in the photos. These add an authenticity to the photos that solidifies their temporal endurance. Without doubt or reservation, I will treasure this book for the rest of my life.

[Suus · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book that radiates joy. The large amount of pictures of men in love, because undoubtedly that's what each and every one of them is, allows us to briefly experience their relationship. We, though photographs taken so many years ago, are allowed in for just that snapshot in time. While flipping through, I could not help but wonder: who are they? How did they meet? For the most part, they remain anonymous, which is perhaps part of the beauty of this book. Couples smiling, touching, holding each other, posing on a cardboard moon and embracing on the beach: their poses, their happiness, transcend time. There are some things to be critical off: there are- as far as I could tell- only two black couples depicted, the majority of the men in this book are white. This could have to do with a myriad of things, social-economic backgrounds, access to a photocamera, racism, but also with availability or the collectors themselves. Additionally, I felt Nini and Treadwell could have been a little more engaging with current queer history scholarship, for example when they discuss how these men could have had their photographs taken. (There were queer photography studios, especially in urban centres as New York or London that had a massive queer subculture!)

But, overall, this book is incredible, wonderful, and I hope the authors continue to collect more, and more photographs so that there may be more books like these. Books like these go a long way to prove that queer history is not just miserable, as some pop culture would have us believe. Gay people were happy, lived entire lives and documented it in photographs.

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful collection of early photographs of male couples from various countries, during a period when their relationships would have been for the most part illegal. There's a really interesting introduction by the collectors of the images, and one of those essays that you only find in art books. At the time they were taken, the photos would not generally have been seen as 'art', mainly being personal snapshots, and rarely shown to any but those who accepted the subjects' relationships, but there is a real poignancy about seeing them all together like this that transforms them to such.

[Monika · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a beautiful collection of photographs in a really gorgeous book!

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I considered taking one star off because the forward was not very good at all (I mean, pretentious and rambling, super repetitive, trying way too hard to be deep) but the rest of it was so delightful I couldn't. The introduction by Hugh and Neal was really interesting. It goes over how they began their collection 20 years ago and how the project grew; they also share some stories about the photographs and trends they noticed across the years and between countries.

They make use some of the similarities that can be found to make the point that love is a universal experience not defined by gender, country, or time. To this end, none of the pictures are labeled and they are not arranged chronologically or geographically but by theme. However, if you want more info, you can turn to the index at the best where the provenance, year, and info is listed - if any of it is known. Sometimes it's very simple, with an approximate year and location, maybe with a simple note like "Frank and Bill at the beach", that sort of thing. Sometimes there is a note written to the recipient of the photo. Sometimes there are jokes or cheeky references to the relationship between the two men. I found myself flipping back and forth to compare the images and the notes on them, but if you want to focus purely on the photographs, there is that option too.

Hugh and Neal have a collection of several thousand of these photographs by now. They said in an interview that they narrowed it down by only including the ones where they were positive of the romantic relationship, and where the quality of the image was good enough for reprinting. Still, I hope that one day they will be able to publish another book with more photographs, because I would love to see more. They also stated that they are trying to find more photographs of men of color, which is underrepresented right now. They otherwise have made a good effort to represent different countries, classes, urban vs country, and age, so I believe them when they say they are making an earnest effort to find more.

It's a coffee table book, so it really doesn't take long to get through, but I recommend taking a moment to really take in every photograph. We know so little of the lives of the men pictures. We don't know if they stayed together the rest of their lives, or if it was a fling, or if they were separated by circumstance or death. But we know that on that day, they loved one another enough to want a memento of their feelings, at a time when the wrong person becoming suspicious could result in ostracization or imprisonment. That speaks to the feeling that must be behind every one. I thought it was beautiful.

[Andy · Rating 5 out of 5]

These men didn’t riot at the Stonewall Inn or sue for the right to marry. Their act of protest – of hope – was to pose together with unguarded body language during a time when homosexuality was a criminal act. They literally created a record of their crime – love.

Arranged by theme or poses (i.e. military, beach, picnic, kissing, etc.), Nini and Treadwell show us that for as much as times have changed, very little has in the ways we show affection – subtle touches, warm embraces, lazy days snuggled together or candid captures of two people at their most vulnerable and pure.

I spent my time going through the collection because it provided me with a serotonin boost that is akin to watching a couple at a wedding. You don’t know what the future holds for this couple, but you are grateful they found one another and can share this moment of happiness.

In “An Accidental Collection,” the authors offer details about how they found these images and determined if love between men was, in fact, being reflected. I appreciated the historical tidbits – for example, from the mid-1800s to mid-1920s posing under an umbrella meant two men were romantically involved – as context to the care and time they’ve put into this hobby.

[Steven · Rating 5 out of 5]

A truly undeniable collection of historical and culture value is featured in these pages! Many of these photos display men with serious expressions in what could be ambiguously interpreted poses; however, look for the points of touch, follow their sight lines, take in their expressions. Pure joy is evident in a number of these photos, capturing moments of freely indulged emotion during typically masked time periods.

Favorite images include:
p30 - for that sly, yet bold grab!
p64 - for its unmistakeable cuteness.
p89 - for the unwavering confidence and determination to be so ballsy in such an era.
p109 - for capturing "the look."
p118 (top right) - for eye-catching composition.
p191 - for certain chemistry.
p279 - for perfect positioning.
p304-305 - for that affectionate leg loop!

[Lilly [Hiatus due to School] · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I worked at Indigo in 2021, I came across this beautiful photo book displayed with a couple of fashion and art photo books. I remember it was on the third floor, and I would walk by it during my rounds. Every time I came for my shift and I was assigned that floor, I would stop by and look through this wonderful collection of photos and get lost - I spent a lot of time during my downtime with this book. I ended borrowing it and a few times. Seeing the love and hope in these photos was something - a peek into the lives of these men who loved and lived in a world that was, and to be honest, still hostile to them was moving. I have no words to be honest that would do this collection justice. I hope one day I can own my own copy.

[MiaReadsMMBooks · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm so happy I made the investment to purchase this book. These photographs (& the two accompanying essays) are a study of love and I honestly was struck so many times at the simple beauty that love really is. This collection is incredible and I sincerely hope that Hugh & Neal's photographs do end up in a permanent collection somewhere, available to the public to witness the beauty of love between two men. I spent a number of hours simply turning the page and quietly observing each photo, I wondered at the lives these men led, the love they had and what they needed to do in order to be together. This is queer history in full view, and they deserve our attention and our thoughts and our love

[Atla Marie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sooooo incredibly beautiful. I wish I had a bookshelf or display table that could do it justice, but for now I'll keep it safe in the mess that is my current living situation.

"These images from around the world also demonstrate the technical evolution of photography and reveal shared affection and mutual delight: they transcend time, place, gender, orientation and speak to our universal longing for love".

I'm always delighted when I discover that the world is braver and more loving than I previously imagined, so THANK YOU Hugh Nini and Neal Treadwell for collecting and publishing this <3

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

WOW! Check out this collection of more than 300 Photographs of Male partnering dating back to the 1850's!
The biggest thing for me, particularly with the older pictures, was knowing that getting pictures taken was no easy thing, so for these to even exist shows just how deep the love goes, and for the homophobia surrounding these times as well. While some may only look friendly, many of them are definitely a defining quality of love and relationships between men!
Bravo to Hugh Nini and all those who contributed to it!

[Denver Public Library · Rating 5 out of 5]

This now famous collection of photographs began with a serendipitous purchase at a flea market. Nini and Treadwell recognized romantic love between the men in the photograph, echoing their own relationship. The two have been married since 1992. Over the years they added photographs to the collection reproduced in this volume.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

A collection that is by turns deeply moving, joyful and astonishing. An important piece history.

[Kristin · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a stunning collection. I only wish that each photo's source information was included adjacent to each picture, rather than in an appendix.

[Austin · Rating 5 out of 5]

tears.

[Leo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Literally so gay

Now I want the sapphic version tho

[Trevor Klundert · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Our collection began when we came across an old photo that we thought was one of a kind. The subjects in the 1920 photo were two young men, embracing and gazing at one another — clearly in love. We looked at that photo, and it seemed to look back at us. And it that singular moment, it reflected us back to ourselves.” This coffee table book is a testament that we have always existed and couples like my husband and I are a continuation of a long line of loving couples who have probably existed since the beginning of time. This collection is also a reminder of how lucky we are to be gay in this modern world….where a photograph of two men in love doesn’t need to be hidden in the back of a dresser drawer or show two men longing to be married but legally cannot. This book reminds me that my husband and I, in love and legally married, are a reflection of the dreams glimmering in the eyes of the men in these photographs.

[Jason · Rating 5 out of 5]

With it being Pride month and with my husband and I set to celebrate our 25th Anniversary later this year, it was a perfect time to dive into this gorgeous book! A collection of photos from the Nini-Treadwell collection, that are deeply moving in their simplicity, and in their strength. In this day and age where it is marginally more easy for someone to come out, these photos beautifully show the strength and bravery of the men who had their pictures taken, in a time period where such evidence was a danger to them. Think about it...a photograph that could be used as a weapon. Defying that, and showing vulnerability and ease and joy, even for a brief moment to immortalize your soul mate... that's the true definition of Loving!

[Thijs Werkman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Een prachtig boek met een bijzondere collectie foto’s.
Ik vind het geen heel groot probleem dat je niet bij alle foto’s 100% zeker weet dat het gaat om de liefde tussen 2 mannen. Maar de kans is zeker groot er is goed onderzoek gedaan en uit het voorwoord en nawoord blijkt dat ze eventuele familie/personen hebben opgezocht die gerelateerd zouden kunnen zijn aan de foto. Ook stond er op veel foto’s een tekst.
Het boek is origineel en mooi uitgegeven. Ik vind het een mooie gedachte dat in de periode waaruit deze foto’s komen (1850-1950) er familie/vrienden waren die achter deze mannen stonden en de liefde tussen deze mensen fotografeerden.

[Chentao · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like the book, however, I found most of the couples are white, with only two couples as black and no other races in the book, despite that Hugh and Nini mentioned that they have large collections around the world and across races. Another thing that is disappointing is that 90% of the photos are from the US.