Our Colorful Past: Dick Belcher Interprets Selections from the Bank of Stockton’s Historical Archives

Our Colorful Past features approximately 50 photographs from the Bank of Stockton’s historical archives interpreted and colorized by Dick Belcher. The exhibition, opening November 18, 2021, includes views of Stockton and the surrounding region giving viewers a glimpse of life during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Bank of Stockton’s extraordinary photography collection consists of more than 40,000 rare, historical images of Stockton, San Joaquin County, and the Mother Lode dating from 1859 to the present. In addition, the collection includes original photographs from nineteenth and early twentieth-century Stockton-based photographers, such as John Pitcher Spooner, Thomas W. Wells, and Van Covert Martin.

Irving “Gully” Martin III was the grandson of the founder and publisher of the Stockton Record, Irving Martin. He is shown here with a group of friends gathered around him in his soapbox race car c. 1930. The boy in the back, directly above Martin has been identified as Elmer Stewart. Image Courtesy of Bank of Stockton.