I first started following Shorpy in the fall of 2011 (didn’t make my first comment till May 2012), so that’s 13 years, making this my 14th "ion" Department Christmas. Over that time, the place where I celebrated Christmas with my wife for 45 years disappeared (burned down) and her parents have died and we were forced to adopt new Christmas customs, but this group in the Office Xmas Party in 1925 has persisted throughout. May they last another century. Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all my fellow Shorpy followers, with a special thanks to Dave for bringing it all to us.

I just noticed that the smiling lady seated on the far right in front (bear and oil can at her knees) has undone (or lost) the top button on her shoe. I hope that if it was the former, she went home and put her feet up to bring the swelling down, and if it was the latter, she got a new pair for Christmas. However I'm sure a good cobbler could have fixed them right up in the event there were not a new pair of kicks beneath her tree. The good news is that it looks like her permanent wave will last until at least Valentine's Day.

The Western Electric Installers' "clever" ballplayers listed in this 1924 article all transferred to D.C. from New York. Each named is likely shown in this pic, probably the ones surrounding their manager, Boss Bill.

I remain completely fascinated by the woman on the floor sitting against the desk, and see from so many past comments that I’m far from alone. If she was a baseball fan a coworker could both pitch and woo with equal fervor.

I don't post much here anymore, but I read the site every day. I look forward to this post every year because I enjoy the comments so much. There's always something new or funny to be read.

I hope all your Shorpyites out there have a wonderful holiday season no matter what you do or don't celebrate. :-)

Walter William Bill Lodding:
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/217917725/walter-w-lodding
https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/details/GWNW-7QB

Thanks Dave and the Shorpy crew, this photo has become one of my comfort constants throughout the year. When I opened the website tonight and saw this photo it feels like seeing my cousins I only see usually once a year. When I listen to music, I have this thought about having a time machine and going back to when a certain vocal or guitar riff is performed for the first time, say any Doors song or Eddie Van Halen playing the lead into You Really Got Me (Eruption). I'd use my machine to go back to when this photo was taken. But then I think, do I want to take the mystery out of it? Nah. Merry Christmas!

These people, on what might be the photographer's third or fourth exposure, are averting their gaze from the mini-explosion of his magnesium flash.

My response to this photo every year is along the lines of Flash's, but I come to a different conclusion. My belief is that there may have been more than one camera trained on this group on that evening 99 years ago, or at least, there were other things going on attracting people's attention.

Conspicuously, the elegant woman seated at the far left is looking off at someone or something on the right of the camera that took this photo. She is not at all the only one. There are two woman seated on the floor who are pointed in the same direction. To them I would probably add the woman wearing the bobby helmet. There are two somewhat goofy looking men standing on the desk at the back who also seem to be smiling to whatever lens the women are looking at. There's a fellow standing right below and to the right of them -- partially obscured -- who is also looking that way.

As a counterpoint, a woman in the center and a man over her shoulder appear to be looking at something to the photographer's right.

If this picture had been taken a half century earlier, in 1875, I would understand the people staring sidewise at a faraway point as a standard photographic custom. I think it had died out well before this party, but I suppose it's possible some folks hadn't gotten the memo.

Even more obviously two years later, far too long a comment, and analysis too, probably not in the Christmas spirit, analysis (dated 12.20.2022, 5:20 pm). But I'll submit it again, and suggest this time you gather some of the comments over the years that strike you one way or another, and put them together in a separate folder. So many comments, would help if you gathered some together. Perhaps this comment or perhaps not, but a selected bunch of comments. Enough to capture the spirit, but not too much, please.

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Obviously far too long a comment, but Shorpy is so inspirational. Still had fun thinking and writing, as well as viewing picture again.

I was wondering about the woman at the far left. She is showing a sideways glance, and nobody else in the picture has a sideways glance. A sideways glance can be a powerful indication of attention to a subject, like romantic attention or professional attention or just surprise, but in any case something out of the ordinary. Like here, it seems different, just that one woman.

Trying to analyze a sideways glance, there is the face angle (determined by the nose angle) and the eyes angle. For a sideways glance like this, the eyes are directly pointed at the subject, but the face is pointed elsewhere. Using a reasonably limited choice of angles (0, 15, 30, 45) and expressing angles as "eyes angle / face angle" (eyes come first, most expressive), then this mystery woman with the sideways glance could be a 0/30.

Directly below her on the floor is a 45/0 woman, and her eyes angle is the extreme opposite. Seems absolute difference between the two angles can show degree of interest or attention, not the amount of either angle. With any 45/0 difference then attention seems to be very much elsewhere. The 30/45 woman to her right apparently has her attention directed to the same subject, but not to the same degree, more a casual interest, just a difference of 15 between her angles.

And the next woman above is a 30/30, also looking in that direction, but no difference between her angles, no indication of interest or attention, just looking.

Also just looking, but now at the camera, are all the 0/0 men and women, no differences, the largest group. They seem to be posing conventionally for the picture, and there is no apparent sign of interest or attention (other than to the camera). The exact pose varies by individual, some are smiling more than others, but they are all 0/0's. Some 0/0's may be simple conformists, and others may be nonconformists bored stiff (they can still smile, for the camera), but you can't probably tell which is which from the picture.

The big boss on the right is a 0/0, and the men in line with him are mostly 0/0's too, diligently following his traditional example. Above him are three 45/45's, you may not be able to tell about attention or interest from a 45/45, no difference there, in that way like a 0/0. However they are definitely not posing for the camera in any conventional way, not following the big boss example, and probably not in line to succeed him. His successor would probably be a 0/0 closest to him.

We could also consider tilt angle of the head as a variable, but that's more difficult to determine, because it varies with perspective, further away or closer to the camera. Also could consider extent of smiles, but that also difficult to determine. Eyes angle and face angle (nose angle) should be easier.

These angle measurements are probably useful only in a posed office photo, like this one. In a family photo 0/0's can be visibly full of emotion. And in real life anyone can look at you straight on, a 0/0, with amazement or fury or love or anything else. So angles won't help much in real life, although a sideways glance can still show interest and then create reciprocal interest, even mutual interest.

WE_xmas_width_750.jpg

Merry Christmas to my Shorpy family. At 17 plus years with Shorpy, it is a daily indulgence that is addicting, but neither fattening or harmful.

Was looking forward to these folks again. Aways a pleasure after so many years, thanks!

The “Boss” was Walter William “Bill”, Lodding who managed and played on the company baseball team in 1924. Several last names were included in a May 6, 1924 “Evening Star” article about the company-ball league in which they played many games.

Soon after this party (maybe due to it?) he found himself transferred to Atlanta. He was born July 1, 1897, and died on March 1, 1940, in Chicago. He left behind wife Agnes and two sons.

"99/9 is about completing one's life lessons, goals, dreams, and actions, whatever the price. Sometimes competition becomes the goal in itself. 99 is the end of a cycle and represents the completion of the ultimate goal. 99 resonates with "doomsday."

If NumerologyPRO is right, we can look forward to some changes come next December 19: Clarence and Hermione may be happily married. The fierce competition of District Superintendents Searles and Baker for promotion to the home office may have led to both being fired. Prohibition may have ended and booze will be on the desks instead of in the oilcan. The bear may have opened a restaurant. The party may have moved to the W. W. Loddings' home, with young Bobby running happily about. Or perhaps the Loddings will have joined forces with Ray and Rose Dickey to host a bash at the Chevy Chase Club. Or the jury-rigged electrical cord may have caught fire and burned down the building. Or the world may have come to an end.

Will they be more cheery for next year's 100th Anniversary Party group picture? Shorpy minds want to know!

Wishing all of the Shorpy community a very Merry Christmas!!

It’s not on Christmas Eve that visions dance through the heads of the Shorpy family, it is the high anticipation of the night before Friday before Christmas!
Merry Christmas, 1925 Party, and Merry Christmas Shorpy family!

This party was during the TEETH of prohibition too! The REAL fun will come later.

Every year I look forward to seeing dear old Mr. Hilter at the top of the picture looking so skeptical!

It's been a rough few years for me (family deaths, health issues), and my Internet usage dropped off considerably. I may have stopped commenting, but I never stopped reading, and I've looked forward to this photo every year for a long, long time. I'm glad that for all the things in flux in this world, the Shorpy Office Xmas Party remains the same.

I wish you and yours the very merriest and happiest of holiday seasons. May your days be merry and bright, and may all your Christmases be white. :-D

Say, we don't view the full size for a micro-study. What we see is the "pyramid" of working stiffs that retracted into one side of the office against the forceful advance of upper management group. Sharp diagonal dividing line was disturbed somewhat at the bottom, by the lady and gent behind her.

MarkJo - nice job finding the real names!

I'm fascinated by the different names and nicknames in all the posts. Then I scroll to 12/23/21; alex_shorpy did a great job labeling everyone. Or go further back to 12/22/19 and see davidk's comment.

I also don't look at these folks as having turned into dust. Every year they come alive in the imaginations of many readers.

Maligayang Pasko to all.

Susanhumeston wondered, "The blond miss sitting on the floor is looking daggers at the moody looking woman sitting against the desk. I will always wonder why."

I have always been intrigued by that interaction. Pretty much come to the conclusion that three of the ladies were diverted by something off set to the left. One (Charlotte) clearly annoyed, one (Lila) merely taking it in, and one (Gwen) mildly amused.

Introducing ...

Charles S. Barker, District Superintendent: "With the right personnel and a good organization, you can do anything in telephony"

E.N. Searles, Division Superintendent

J.E. Grant, R.D. Dick, and...

Walter W. Lodding, Division Accountant
... with an invitation to Christmas at the Loddings':

This image was featured in the December 1926 issue of the Western Electric News with the title: "YOUTH AND THE CHRISTMAS SPIRIT" and caption: "Santa Claus did right by this little lad the son of W.W. Lodding of the Installation Division 11 Headquarters"

After passing this photo around for everyone to look and laugh at, it was probably hung on the wall for a time, then taken to someone's home and put away in a chest and forgotten ... perhaps copies were made.

But how would these people feel if they knew that almost a half million people have studied it?

Also those desks have been in their current positions for a very long time, the floor below them new and pristine.

[This was not a casual snapshot -- the National Photo Company was primarily a news service. Its photographs appeared in newspapers, advertisements and publicity material. This particular image might have been used for Western Electric's in-house newsletter or a company Christmas card. - Dave]

Thank ya Dave for clearing that up.

May your holidays be merry and bright. A special Merry Christmas to Dave and tterrace who keep this very special website going. And to all pictured from that office party held nearly 100 years ago, a Merry Heavenly Christmas to all!

I expect that the number of reads for Office Xmas Party will pass 500,000 shortly. Is this a record number of reads for a Shorpy photo?

[Office Xmas Party holds the No. 2 spot. Shorpy's most popular post is ... Lady in the Water, with over 640,000 reads. And at No. 3 is The Beaver Letter. - Dave]

There is something on his pointer finger and thumb. Could these be some type of grippers for leaving through papers? Could it be he was working until they forced him to come get his picture taken? He is clearly annoyed to be there. Maybe he is plotting to have the boss removed so he can be in charge?

I finally gave this picture a very close inspection and have noticed a few things:

The Wizard of Oz tin man seems to be absent, although is oil can is sitting on the floor, bold as brass. Perhaps Al Capone knows of the tin man's whereabouts, although he and his cigar are apparently saying nothing? Maybe Al hired "Mr. Bowtie" from the top row. He has the look of someone ready to rub someone out with his own personal brand of ink blotter. One other notable "character" is to the left of Al Capone. I think it's possibly New York's former governor, a spritely, young Andrew Cuomo.

Dear Shorpy folks and friends of the site.

This year I used this very photo to make a SPOT THE DIFFERENCE game at our work Christmas party.

Each of the participants had 20 minutes to spot all 19 differences. I used Photoshop and AI to make the changes to the photo and we all had so much fun with it.

If you would like me to post that image here, you may have fun too! Let me know Dave!

Also, we have some new friends that might be joining us on this site as they were fascinated by all the expressions of this 1925 party. I did inform them of the site and URL.

Merry Christmas everyone

The blond and brunette whose backs are against the door and doorjamb, respectively, look modern. The other modern looking girl is two rows in front of them, also a brunette. These three look timeless. The other women either still have long hair wrapped up some way or they have those awful finger waves that look like ridges in their hair. None of the girls that have finger waves have benefitted from that style. It does not flatter any face shape, it just looks weird and kind of Bride of Frankensteinish.

The blond miss sitting on the floor is looking daggers at the moody looking woman sitting against the desk. I will always wonder why.

about these folk for a good decade since discovering Shorpy, I have come to a tentative yet preliminary assessment.

The only woman with no apparent makeup and yet the most beautiful features is the lady sitting on the floor at bottom left. Really in a class of her own in this crowd with those almond eyes and high cheekbones, yet with hair and dressed a bit out of date, but still sporting brand new shoes judging by their soles. How they got her to sit on the dirty floor for the pic is beyond me.

In any case, the photographer has just given her a huge suggestive wink, and she's snapped her head to the right in response, looking faintly amused / bemused, no doubt used to the unwanted male gaze. The woman second to her left is staring at her, annoyed that Gloria (for that is her name) has caught the roving eye of the photographer instead of her -- the body language is obvious. The flapper two to the left of Ms Envious is giving the photographer a bit of a come-on with her lopsided grin -- she has sussed out his game.

Mr Fatlips the boss is terminally near-sighted but for photos and thus posterity takes his glasses off when posing, as one can see. What he looks like with them on is a subject for a horror movie.

The rest of the crowd barring a few are to a greater or lesser degree tipsy on smuggled-in booze, it being Temperance Time, er, prohibited drinkees time in America

I'll have an update in future when other things become more clear to me from my favorite Shorpy image.

Merry Xmas to all!

Just behind the gentleman with the "GO" signal on his head it looks like there is a classic soda/acid fire extinguisher that I noticed for the first time today. Conveniently located next to what appears to be a rather combustible tree. Season's Greetings to Dave, tterrace and the whole Shorpy gang.

It's hard to imagine this bunch "working from home". The dynamic would be lost with a "Zoom" holiday party.

... when this bunch show up. I checked; they're all there. Proceed to celebrate. Merry Christmas, everyone xoxo

Although certainly macabre, I do like the door that iamjanicemarie tentatively opened and that HarahanTim swung fully open. In what order did these people pass? The annual response to this photo has definitely taken a curious turn, but I’m glad to chime in.

First to go, I believe, was Boss Man with the cigar, the very next morning, in the wee hours. He’s clearly in bad physical shape, a massive coronary waiting to happen. And it wasn’t the fault of one of those young ladies sitting on the floor that it happened in her bed. It was a different time when office and sexual politics were vile, and everyone was drunk.

Last to go was Heather on the far left in back, framed by the glass of the door. She’s only 23 in the photo, and she lived right into the next century, dying at 102 in 2004. She had moved back to Ohio, and on her last day was surrounded by her children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and even one of her great-great-grandchildren. They all loved her very much.

This firm has a very stable workforce. Every year, it's the same folks in the Christmas photo.

Nice to see familiar faces, even though I never met them. However much they aged after this photograph, we'll never know, so just once each year, it's 1925 again.

. . . and all Shorpy friends, too!

I look forward to seeing this wonderful photo every year. These folks never age, unlike the rest of us. I find this reassuring: life goes on, as it did for the office partiers whose lives continued through the Depression, WWII, and possibly even on to the 1990s. I always wonder who they were and what happened to them.

Here's to a Happy Holiday season and a peaceful 2024.

I never get tired of this party and these coworkers. The job, yeah, I'm sick of it, but the people make it all worthwhile. I feel like I've known them forever.

Are they wearing kryptonite jewelry?

I have gotten to the point of looking so forward to this party each year, it has indeed become one of my favorite Christmas traditions! LOL

For most of those attending the party, they are indeed, "living life!" That is so valuable, the ability to live life. On a personal note, I am learning that this year, having lost my precious wife in March, to Dementia. As iamjanicemarie well noted, all of these, are now just "dust in the wind."

Which makes me wonder, in what order did they pass? Did some in the picture in 1925 not survive till the party in 1926? Who was the last to go, and in what year? In the hundreds of comments, some pointing out actual things, others just speculating ... we can learn one lesson.

Live Life Fully Every Day. Who knows, a hundred years from now, you may still be having an effect on someone who you never even met!

Merry Christmas, Shorpy family!

That was a quick year.

Been seeing this annually for a long time now, am I the first to comment ?? Anyways all these souls, their troubles and happy days are behind them and now are just dust in the wind … enjoy yourselves as we will be dust too! Merry Christmas

I love how the ladies' hair has that "Bride of Frankenstein" look ... creepy yet sexy. It reminds me to get the yule log out.

Obviously far too long a comment, but Shorpy is so inspirational. Still had fun thinking and writing, as well as viewing picture again.

I was wondering about the woman at the far left. She is showing a sideways glance, and nobody else in the picture has a sideways glance. A sideways glance can be a powerful indication of attention to a subject, like romantic attention or professional attention or just surprise, but in any case something out of the ordinary. Like here, it seems different, just that one woman.

Trying to analyze a sideways glance, there is the face angle (determined by the nose angle) and the eyes angle. For a sideways glance like this, the eyes are directly pointed at the subject, but the face is pointed elsewhere. Using a reasonably limited choice of angles (0, 15, 30, 45) and expressing angles as "eyes angle / face angle" (eyes come first, most expressive), then this mystery woman with the sideways glance could be a 0/30.

Directly below her on the floor is a 45/0 woman, and her eyes angle is the extreme opposite. Seems absolute difference between the two angles can show degree of interest or attention, not the amount of either angle. With any 45/0 difference then attention seems to be very much elsewhere. The 30/45 woman to her right apparently has her attention directed to the same subject, but not to the same degree, more a casual interest, just a difference of 15 between her angles.

And the next woman above is a 30/30, also looking in that direction, but no difference between her angles, no indication of interest or attention, just looking.

Also just looking, but now at the camera, are all the 0/0 men and women, no differences, the largest group. They seem to be posing conventionally for the picture, and there is no apparent sign of interest or attention (other than to the camera). The exact pose varies by individual, some are smiling more than others, but they are all 0/0's. Some 0/0's may be simple conformists, and others may be nonconformists bored stiff (they can still smile, for the camera), but you can't probably tell which is which from the picture.

The big boss on the right is a 0/0, and the men in line with him are mostly 0/0's too, diligently following his traditional example. Above him are three 45/45's, you may not be able to tell about attention or interest from a 45/45, no difference there, in that way like a 0/0. However they are definitely not posing for the camera in any conventional way, not following the big boss example, and probably not in line to succeed him. His successor would probably be a 0/0 closest to him.

We could also consider tilt angle of the head as a variable, but that's more difficult to determine, because it varies with perspective, further away or closer to the camera. Also could consider extent of smiles, but that also difficult to determine. Eyes angle and face angle (nose angle) should be easier.

These angle measurements are probably useful only in a posed office photo, like this one. In a family photo 0/0's can be visibly full of emotion. And in real life anyone can look at you straight on, a 0/0, with amazement or fury or love or anything else. So angles won't help much in real life, although a sideways glance can still show interest and then create reciprocal interest, even mutual interest.

Meanwhile, every year I look less like my father and more like my grandfather.

Frank is holding up an equipment assignment sheet while calling (vainly) for the frivolity to end and a return to work. He will not succeed.

I wonder how many of them were concealing new books in their purses, briefcases, or desk drawers. It was an era of readers, and 1925 was a banner year. Here are some of the newly-printed titles waiting for them in bookstores:

Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
Hemingway, In Our Time
Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway
Dreiser, An American Tragedy
Christie, The Secret of Chimneys
Dos Passos, Manhattan Transfer
Cather, The Professor’s House
Loos, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
Milne, a Winnie the Pooh story at Christmas
Kafka, The Trial (if you read German)
Proust, Albertine Disparue (if you read French—though some of them may still be working through the 1922 translation of Swann’s Way).

By December, early subscribers could have accumulated ten months of the new “New Yorker.”

But let’s hope that they still had a few years to be blissfully unaware of Mein Kampf, published in Germany in July.

Thanks for the labor of love and commerce Shorpy is. Years ago this photo evoked for me speculations about what may have divided these office mates. Now what comes out of this photo is the love that is possible if only ... with enough time and enough patience and enough "having lived through" being absent from one another we arrive at a finality of cherishing "in spite of" or even "because of" the uniqueness we bring.

If nothing else, we have made great advances in Christmas tree technology.