A found film mystery from a Central California thrift shop

Excerpts from ABC10 News

Josh Bohart, an old camera enthusiast, wants to find the people in these images. The 18-year-old Folsom Lake College student has a hobby of collecting cameras. Frequenting local thrift shops where he often finds cameras, he recently bought an Argus C3 camera for under $8 to add to his camera collection. “Whenever I go down to Goodwill, I find cameras, and then as soon as I get home I will do research. I’ll watch videos on how to use them,” Sometimes, Josh said, he finds film inside his purchases, but the film he found in the Argus C3 was different. The roll of Kodak film looked dated – vintage.

“I went to clean it, opening the back and saw film in it, and it quickly – I had to close it because of the light. I was like, ‘Oh no!'” he recalled.

He sent it to a company called the Darkroom, located in Southern California, which specializes in developing old film.

“They will process your film and they give you the scans back,” Bohart explained. “Like, a week later, I got the scans back. I saw the first photo, flipped out, ran downstairs, told my mom, ‘Oh my god, look at these!’ right?”

What the company sent back to him sent shivers down his spine: 20 family photos in remarkably good condition for sitting undeveloped in a camera for more than 50 years.

“I was just amazed that this thing had captured great photos that stayed basically how they were 50, 60 years ago,” Bohart said. “The ones of, like, the girl and her father or uncle, I’m not sure, that one looks like it was taken yesterday, and it’s just fantastic how a camera like this could kind of, like, seal those in a box and keep them safe for all this time.”

Clues in the photos point to the time they were taken: Bohart guesses around 1960, give or take a year or two. Two girls are pictured sitting on a John Deere 630 tractor, which according to TractorData.com was manufactured between 1958 and 1960. The tractor in the photo looks relatively new.

Also, two of the girls are wearing cat-eye glasses, fashionable in the 50s and 60s. The Argus C3 would have been a widely used camera during that time as well.

Bohart’s mom Cindy Bohart said when her son saw the photos, he knew what he had to do.

“Josh just kind of lit up and said, ‘We need to find the owners,'” she recounted to ABC10 News. “Our first thought was, ‘Wow, these belong somewhere – not in an old camera, not somewhere where they’re just going to be thrown out into somebody’s Goodwill bin.'”

Now Josh is asking for the public’s help in identifying the men, women, girls and boys in the photo.

“Those kids in those photos are probably still here. I need to find them,” Bohart said. “Because it would be amazing to hand them these very, very cool family photos, because back then you only had film. There was no digital, so what if those pictures of their mother, their father, their grandfather, what if those were really the only ones that they had?”

Since Goodwill locations will spread out donations among multiple stores, it’s unclear whether the camera was donated at the Folsom Goodwill or elsewhere. Even if it was donated at the Folsom Goodwill, that doesn’t guarantee the photos were snapped anywhere locally.

“That is the biggest problem with this because these could’ve been taken in, like, Oklahoma or who knows where,” he said. “I will not stop until I find them because it’s just like, it means so much to me because they deserve the photos.”

If you think you might know the people in these pictures or have a clue about the location, Bohart created a Facebook page where people can discuss the photos and submit tips.