The Countryside

Mabel Osgood Wright, Wilson’s Mill near Black Rock Turnpike, c. 1900

Mabel Osgood Wright, Fairfield Beach at Low Tide in October, c. 1900

Mabel Osgood Wright, Bronson Herd on Bronson Road, c. 1900

Mabel Osgood Wright, Woods by Stream, c. 1900

Mabel Osgood Wright, Wakeman’s Island, c. 1900

Mabel Osgood Wright, Bronson Estate, c. 1900

Mabel Osgood Wright, Pond in Winter, Birdcraft Sanctuary, c. 1900

In the late nineteenth century, as the United States became an industrial and urban nation, many writers and thinkers became concerned that the country was losing its core, rural values. Like many of her peers, Mabel Osgood Wright lamented the spread of “city hours and conventionalities” and viewed the preservation of the countryside as a means to maintain the nation’s traditional, agrarian character.

In these photographs, Wright focuses on Fairfield’s mills, farms, and wildlife, which all faced an uncertain future at the turn of the twentieth century.