Stephan Gmelin was an amateur maritime photographer based out of Cranford, NJ. He was also a longtime member of SSHSA, serving on the Board of Directors from 1951-1960 and writing eight articles for Steamboat Bill. Gmelin passed away on July 11, 2001.
This collection is available to the public by appointment at the Steamship Historical Society. Objects that are fragile, significant, or require additional tools to access may require archivist assistance.
Use, reproduction, and/or publication of archival material is prohibited without prior approval of the Steamship Historical Society. Fees and/or restrictions may apply. Please contact the SSHSA archivist, Astrid Drew, at adrew@sshsa.org for more information.
Stephan Gmelin Photograph Collection, 2004.03, Steamship Historical Society of America Archives, www.sshsa.org.
The Stephan Gmelin Collection contains approximately 2,000 black and white and color negatives of ships and SSHSA meetings, along with several 8mm and one 16 mm film on various maritime themes. Most of the images are of cargo ships, with some ocean liners and passenger excursion ships/boats. Some of the negatives were produced by Gmelin's brother, Alexander Gmelin. The images in this collection were taken between 1921-1989.
Negatives are arranged in four boxes by ship name in alphabetical order. Films are loosely stored with other films in the SSHSA collection.
This collection was donated to the SSHSA by Gmelin’s son, Robert, in August 2004. It was retroactively accessioned by Assistant Archivist Tessa Mediano in May 2023 with the accession number 2004.03.
Abbazia - Dutchess
E.B. Barber - Lurline
Madawaska - Sierra
Sienos Island - Zeilin, SSHSA negatives and prints (some by R. Loren Graham)